#for many it takes active effort to speak the native language of our own country

[youneedasoultraveller]

Is Nicky the only one headcanoned by people as bad with languages or are Nile and Booker seen the same way too (Andy is of course excluded from that due to her age and Joe is universally depicted as skilled with languages) ? I would expect Nile to be seen as bad with languages due to the American education system but it doesn’t seem to be the case.

Hello! Post-response me would like to apologise once again for the length of this post :(

I have personally not found a single fic where either Booker or Nile were depicted bad with languages; at most I found fics where Nile cannot speak languages other than English yet and you have the rest of the Guard routinely teaching her this and that idiom.

So, no, in my experience the only one that I saw people actively headcanon as bad at languages is Nicolò. Even though exactly as you point our if we want to go by stereotypes the one that should have been hc’d as such should have been Nile precisely because the large majority of Anglos are monolingual and the way languages are taught in their educational systems is horrendous to say the least (I will never forget my experiences studying Arabic in a Canadian university).

As it stands, Nile is shown using a couple of words of Pashtu, and if I remember correctly it is mentioned that she speaks Spanish in her presentation card, but if it’s the average American knowledge of Spanish “mi casa es su casa” then I would not call that speaking it. But these are just suppositions :)

So canon doesn’t give us much, that we know. And this is where headcanons come in. Like I was saying, usually people would not write Nile as multilingual but as someone who is in the process of learning several languages.

No one is indicated that she is bad at it, although if you ask pratically anyone in the world they will tell you that Americans and Brits are the worst at both learning and speaking other languages, because in those cultures there is a deep imperialist bias engrained – whether they are aware or not – that everyone in the world speaks English, so they can spare the effort to try to pronounce properly another language, or, God forbid, learn it at all. Nothing indicates us that Nile butchers or not other languages, and no one ever takes it into account.

As for Booker, he is French so normally Anglos would have also made fun of his way of talking if it had not been for Matthias.

And now I reach my point. The main reason why Nicolò is consistently depicted as terrible at languages is because of Luca’s Italian accent, and the fact that you can see he is not as fluent in English as Marwan and Matthias are, who are like him not native speakers. This even though the man speaks five languages.

I am not going into the whole mess with interviews with native English speakers who treated him as if he were dumb just because he could not really understand their accent (I myself often have to slow down and ask for a repeat, because some accents are just not as immediately intelligible as Anglos think), given that it has been discussed at length.

The only thing I want to stress is how this headcanon is extremely imperialistic, condescending and plays once again into the harmful stereotype of the dumb, illiterate Southerner.

Linguistic discrimination is a thing, and it’s a thing everywhere. By linguistic discrimination I don’t just mean that against people who cannot speak a major language (or the “official” language of the country they are in), but it also affects accents.Accents have everything to do with geography and class: it is a marker of where you are from, and plays into prejudices linked to the social standing and the class usually associated to that accent. Now, languages are a natural process, in continuous evolution and adaptation, whereas standardised languages (including a standardised pronunciation) are artificial choices. Just think of British vs American English: they are both theoretically the same language, but they diverge in several instances in terms of both vocabulary and pronunciation.Whip this up to the max when it comes to speaking a language that is not your own. The sounds and grammar structures of your mother tongue have an impact on the way you process a different language. That’s why it’s difficult for Spanish-speakers to pronounce S + consonant at the beginning of a word, or why Slavic languages have a harder H sound (again at the beginning of a word). Even when you have the grammar and pronunciation down to a T and are virtually indistinguishable from a native speaker, it does not mean that people who lose their accents and speak like a BBC tv host are any better at languages than people whose accent is still noticeable, or whose speech flow may be slower.

Having an accent does not qualify the level of fluency in a set language. Not speaking like a dictionary does not qualify the level of your intelligence (and I cannot believe I have to even say that).

And yet having an accent is politicised for classist and racist purposes. If someone does not blend in 100% with the majority, it means that something is lacking in them: usually it means they do not have the same level of education, which means they probably come from a lower class, or that they also are foreigners. So they are less than, just because their speech is deemed as not up to par with that of the majority.

@lucyclairedelune meant this when she brought up the example of Gloria from Modern Family, saying “you don’t know how intelligent I am in Spanish”. I want to make an example that is closer to my heart. Elena Ferrante in her wondrous Neapolitan Quartet described the life of a girl who was trying to escape from the material and psychological misery of the slums of Naples in the 60s. To do so she migrates North to study at one of Italy’s most prestigious university: here, however, she is bullied for her accent that clearly marks her origins and (prejudicially, since people of the South were in general poorer) status, class, and, finally, categorises her as less intelligent. Just because of her accent when speaking standard Italian. As a Southern Italian woman, I have often felt like I had to mask my own accent, both in Italy and abroad, to be taken seriously. This regardless of my academic qualifications or how many languages I speak. 

When people describe Nicolò as bad at languages simply because Luca has an accent and speaks English slower and less fluently than his co-stars, this is the context that this treatment plays in. Subconsciously (or consciously) it adds to the image that a big chunk of the fandom is painting of him as dumb and ignorant. No one else. And the fact that (luckily) no one ever uses Nile’s monolingualism as a marker for being less intelligent is also because being American is still taken as the standard, as well as the fact that unfortunately Nile (like Yusuf) is going through positive discrimination by which she cannot have any complexity or flaws (starting from hardly ever acknowledging the fact that she herself was part of an invader/occupying foreign force which has bombed and killed civilians in Afghanistan, and was in the midst of a military operation exactly in this sense). 

According to that specific discourse, Nicolò is being given every single possible flaw, in order to be opposite to Yusuf. Again, because this fandom, with its Anglocentrism and Puritan incapacity of overcoming black-and-white oppositions, cannot seem to accept that we have a beautiful interracial, interreligious same-sex couple of complex individuals, who can both be smart at the same time. I myself think that Yusuf historically is better at languages than Nicolò, as he was a merchant (and an artist), and I love this difference about them, but conflating intelligence with proficiency in one single language (because it’s only proficiency English that we have been discussing, let’s be honest, if the show had been shot in German we would not be talking about Luca’s issues with the language probably) is an utterly imperialistic, condescending and ridiculous thing to do.

I probably lost the train of my thought (and I had two beers in the meantime, so I am too tired to reread), but what I mainly wanted to highlight is that this mocking attitude towards Nicolò is rooted in both a  wider downgrading trend of his character, and on a general approach towards non-English speakers that Anglos have virtually everywhere.

[mymarvelbunch]

Be Your Own Hero - Steve Rogers x Reader (part 7)

Masterlist

Summary: You’ve lost all your family and most friends in The Decimation. Refusing to believe their deaths are permanent, you dedicate years to find a way to reverse it. Upon finding something that might help, you search for the Avengers’ help. It’s Steve Rogers x Reader, but in reality it’s mostly Badass!Reader. Also, Non-American!Reader

Warnings: none!

Note: Y/Co = your country. Y/Ci = your city; Y/N/L = your native language.

This part is going to be told mostly from Steve’s POV, along with a few other characters. Reader will come back in part 8!

Previously: Reluctantly, she took it and gave her broken timer to you. “I’ll come back for you, Y/N. We don’t risk lives.” “Bring everyone back first”, you screamed, trying to be heard in the midst of the noise. Someone was entering the temple. “Only then you come back for me. Now go!” With no hesitation this time, Nebula left.

Edit: I fixed a small detail on parts 6 and 7. Originally I had the Mind Stone being collected in Titan, but it was the last Stone Thanos got, on Earth. I made minor corrections so it would fit movie canon in this aspect.

Part Seven

Battle of New York, 2012

“This looks even crazier in person”, Scott said as past Hulk was seen throwing some Chitauri to the sky.

“Banner would be so embarrassed if saw himself like this”, Natasha said. At her side, Clint nodded.

“Okay guys”, Steve stepped up. “If I remember correctly, Loki is about to be defeated. We have to get to the Tower and get the Tesseract and the Scepter. Try not to die. We’ve survived worse.”

“I can pull myself and tiny Scott up”, Clint offered. “Not sure how you and Nat will do it, though.”

“This is an alternate timeline, right?”, Natasha replied. “Our actions here won’t impact our future, only theirs. Honestly, I think we can just step in.”

Steve nodded. “You have a point, Nat. But maybe Clint and Scott should go through the window anyway. If something delays us two, at least they will be already in place and can try to retrieve the Stones without us.”

The other three nodded. Scott activated his suit and shrunk. Clint placed him inside a vest pocket and headed to the avenue. He and Natasha headed to the Tower’s main entrance. “So, you and Y/N?”, Natasha asked.

He did his best to keep a straight face, being caught off guard. “This is really not the time to set me up with her, Nat”, he replied. “Don’t think I didn’t realize what you’ve been doing these past weeks.”

“It’s worked, hasn’t it?”, she said, grinning, as he pressed the elevator button, so far going unnoticed amidst the chaos.

“Like I said, not the time”, he deadpanned and turned to the elevator. Thoughts about you tried to creep into his mind, but he quickly pushed them aside. He’d wonder about what you meant to him after the Stones were all collected.

The elevator ride was as fast as he remembered. There was a time when he had his own floor in that Tower, designed by Tony himself. Many thoughts of guilt and regret came over him, but again he pushed those aside. He and Tony have made peace with each other long ago; there was no point in dwelling on past mistakes.

When the doors opened, the scene that greeted them was kind of funny: 2012 Clint and 2021 Clint were pointing arrows at each other, and 2012 Tony was giggling non-stop while the Tesseract was slowly falling down from his hands - probably Scott’s doing. Everyone else just looked confused, including Loki.

2012 Steve stepped out as soon as he and Natasha got out of the elevator. “Stay where you are, whoever you are”, he said, in a commanding voice that did nothing but annoy him.

“That’s not happening anytime soon”, he replied, taking some steps closer. “We are from the future, and we have urgent business.”

“Yeah, that’s what this other guy said a minute ago”, 2012 Clint said, not taking his eyes away from his future version. “Not buying it, fake Cap.”

He sighed, noticing Natasha slip away. She’d probably have to deal with her own past self to retrieve the Scepter, so he concluded it would be better if he distracted the rest of them. “Bucky is alive”, he told his past version. “HYDRA is still active-”

“Oh, now you’re just making things up”, his past self interrupted.

“Really? Go tell ‘Hail Hydra’ to Pierce and Runlow. See if I’m telling you any bullshit.”

That called Tony’s attention. “You really want us to believe you’re a real Cap when you say ‘bullshit’?”

He rolled his eyes. “I fought in the war for years, I can actually do a lot worse than ‘bullshit’.” He turned to his past self. “You know that pretty well.”

“You call us out for cursing″, 2021 Clint replied, smirking.

“That was one time, in 2015. It’s been six years, get over already!”

“If I may speak”, Loki said, adjustig his position as best as he could, “I was raised by a witch mother and learned magic myself-”

“Yeah, we noticed”, past Clint murmured.

“-and those folks are telling the truth. All four of the are from eleven years in the future.”

Thor nodded, although he was frowning. “My brother is right this time - we were raised by the same woman, so I know a thing or two -, but I fail to notice four companions from the future. I can only see three.”

As if waiting for that exact curtain call, the Tesseract finally fell from Tony’s hands. Scott instantly turned back to his normal size, Tesseract in hand, and, at the same moment, Natasha grabbed the Scepter. “Let’s go!”, she exclaimed, suiting up along with Scott. Past Natasha tried to get her, but 2021 Clint was faster in hitting her with an arrow, activating his Quantum suit right after. Only he remained, but he gave no time for the others to get him.

Avengers Headquarters, 2021

The first thing Steve heard was Rhodes asking, “Have you gotten enough of those?”, to which Tony replied affirmatively. Before he could ask what they were talking about, though, he noticed someone was missing. Or rather, you were missing.

“Nebula”, he began, “where is Y/N?”

She closed her eyes for a moment, but, when she opened them again, it was with a look of determination. “We need to gather the Stones first. I’ll tell everything while we do it.”

He opened his mouth to protest, but she was already on her way to the table where the new Gauntlet was at, along with Scott, Natasha and Rhodes. Banner had already begun to put the Stones in place, with Danvers’ help. 

“My brain...”, Nebula began, “it’s connected to a sort of intranet. When we were about to leave, past me’s brain connected to mine... and our location was given away.”

“But you escaped”, he said. “What happened to Y/N?” He held his breath as he waited for her answer.

“My timer broke”, she said. “I should have been the one to stay behind, but Y/N... she took her own timer off and switched with mine. Said it would be safer if she was the one to be kidnapped, because that way they couldn’t try to send my past version to fool you.”

Steve stood up and started pacing around. Once again, you were the most sensible one in this team, but he couldn’t bring himself to calm down. The thought of you being at Thanos’ hands, all alone...

“Why are we not going back there yet?”, he asked, more venom in his voice than intended.

“She made me promise we’d make our wish first”, Nebula said.

“I know you’re worried, Steve”, Tony said behind him. “We all are. But thing is, if we bring everyone back first, we’ll have more people to aid us in that rescue. I assume Thanos is with his army, right?” Nebula nodded. “So, we need an army of our own.”

Tony was right. Nebula was right. You were right. But still, Steve’s heart was on his throat. All worst possible scenarios popped up in his head. Faintly, he felt two people gently push him back to the couch.

Flashes of the last weeks passed through his mind. You two had a mildly rough start, thanks to his (reasonable) initial distrust. But soon enough he warmed up to you, especially when he saw your brief interaction with Tony’s little girl.

He opened up to you while training and watching movies. More than he usually did, but there was something about you that made him want to tell everything. Maybe it was your compassion, which he saw first hand more than once. Maybe it was your contagious laugh, especially when you watched weird YouTube videos when things started to get too heavy, too dark. Maybe it was your smile, your eyes, your soothing voice...

At that moment, he realized he had fallen for you in the span of a month. And now you were in grave danger, and he had to wait for the rest of the team to be revived to go to your rescue.

Speaking of which, he was so lost in thought he missed the part where Bruce was chosen to wield the gauntlet and snap his fingers. He was brought back to reality by Tony. “Raise your shield, Cap”, he shouted. “And stay as far as possible.”

He did as told, standing up from the couch, and took a few steps until his back touched the glass walls. Bruce screamed in pain as he wore the gauntlet, but managed to snap his fingers all the same. Thor was instantly by his side, checking if he was okay. Meanwhile, Clint called his wife, and Scott went to the window. “Everything is coming back guys”, he shouted. “Even plants and animals!”

He sighed in relief. “Now”, he then said, “we need to gather ourselves to go get Y/N back.”

Nebula nodded, followed by everyone in the room. “How are we going to do it?”, Bruce asked, massaging his burned arm. “Most are in Wakanda, and some are out in space.”

“Technically, we have time”, Tony said. “We’ll go to the exact time Nebula left Y/N, regardless of how long we wait for them to come to us. What we do need, though, is to contact them. Does anyone have King T’Challa’s phone, or something? Or maybe-”

He was interrupted by a sling ring appearing in the middle of the room. A man in a cape stepped out, followed by Peter Parker and... aliens. “We have to hurry”, the man said. “Thanos is currently trying to figure out a way to use Y/N Y/L/N to come to 2021. If he succeeds, your efforts will be in vain, and the whole universe will be doomed. There is no time to waste.”

He faintly heard someone calling him Strange (so he must be the wizard he heard so much about), while the man himself opened more sling rings. Bucky and Sam stepped out of one, along with Groot, Wanda, T’Challa, Okoye and Shuri. Wong, Nicky Fury and Maria Hill from aanother ring. A female warrior, who Thor called Lady Sif, stepped out of a third. A woman Scott called Hope came from a fourth, and Pepper showed up in a fifth, suited up in blue and silver armor.

He sat back on the couch, mesmerized. People were hugging each other, glad to have them back. Bucky went to him and smiled, which prompted him to stand up and hug him, Before he could do the same to Sam, though, Strange called them out. “There will be time for reunions later”, he said. “Right now, we have to rescue Miss Y/L/N and stopping Thanos from coming back.” He turned to Tony. “Do we have resources to get everyone to travel there?”

Tony nodded. Rhodes briefly explained how 2017 Strange sensed they’d need more Pym Particles. Tony went to the 1975 to get some, while Rhodes broke into Hank Pym’s home in 2018 to get another amount. Tony had already made extra Quantum Suits, which was enough for nearly everyone.

“I think we can leave Bruce out”, Natasha said. “He needs to recover.”

Bruce thanked her for the consideration, and passed his suit to Drax, who was eager to fight Thanos. He and Nebula briefly explained the recent events while Tony gave the suits to everyone who was up to fight. Only Bruce, Wong and Groot didn’t get one - Wong because he’d rather stay behind to watch for threats (since he could alert Strange of them using magic), and Groot because Tony didn’t think of adapting the suit for a tree (Rocket’s design was already unique).

They all gathered around the platform once again. He was in no mood for another motivational speech, but apparently he had to. “I think we all know the importance of this mission”, he said. “Not only we have a teammate to rescue, we have an entire universe to save from destruction. Take care of one another. Try not to die. If injured or exhausted, return to our time immediately.” He took a deep breath. “On the count of five.”

Morag, 2014

Nebula managed to set their timer to the exact second after she left, but there still wasn’t enough time to get to you before Thanos did. From afar, he saw your unconscious body being carried away to the enormous spaceship. “Fuck”, he muttered. Then he shouted, “We have to try to get in the ship!” And started to run.

Thanos’ team was faster, though, and the ship took flight before any of them could get in. He closed his eyes, taking deep breaths to calm himself down.

“My old ship is down there”, he heard a male voice say. “If we get inside it now, we can still reach them. You know where they’re going, Nebula?”

He turned to see Nebula nodding. “I have an idea.”

He followed the man named Quill to another spaceship, which was way smaller. “Okay, it won’t fit everyone”, he said, as if reading his thoughts.

“If any of you don’t manage to get in”, Steve said, loud enough for everyone to hear, “you are free to go back to 2021.”

He could tell there were people who didn’t really want to fight. The praying-mantis-like alien clearly stayed behind on purpose, and so did Rocket with his tree friend. Steve, however, was the second to get inside, followed by Nebula, Nat, Tony and Thor - and then he lost track of order.

In the end, Bucky also stayed behind, along with Okoye, Princess Shuri, Maria Hill, Nick Fury, Strange, Parker, Wanda and Pepper. “Most of them would be useful”, he said.

“I think Strange knows another something we don’t, Steve”, Tony said. “He seemed to have stayed behind on purpose.”

“I hope he damn knows what he’s doing then”, he replied, closing his fists. Natasha sat beside him.

“Everything will work out fine, Steve”, she said with a calm voice. “Soon Y/N will be with us again, and you’ll tell her how you feel.”

He side-eyed her. “Didn’t I say it wasn’t the time for this?”

“Yeah, in 2012. Besides, I saw you realizing your feeling backs in the headquarters. It was so clear in your face, anyone who looked would know exactly what you were thinking.”

“I did!”, Danvers exclaimed. “It was really sweet.”

He rolled his eyes, but a half-smile escaped.

Nebula’s POV

Nebula managed to track Thanos’ ship signal, and Quill disabled his own, rendering them practically invisible. “It’s usually not worth it”, he explained when someone asked why ships didn’t do that all the time. “The ship’s shields weaken a bit, for starters, and being traceable is useful when you are in distress.”

“In Thanos’ case”, she added, “his ship has to leave the signal turned on for his allies to find him. Besides, he is sure no one would try to attack him. As you saw on Morag, his crew is large in numbers.”

“Is there a way to attach this ship to Thanos’?”, Danvers asked.

Quill nodded. “I’ve never tried it, though. If you have any experience, feel free to.” It surprised Rocket and Nebula to see Quill acting this humble, but then they remembered Gamora’s death was still fresh to him. He was probably still in grief mood. It occurred to her that she’d probably face the 2014 version of her sister (and herself). She wasn’t really ready to see her after so many years, especially since she didn’t have memories of their reconciliation.

Danvers took Quill’s seat and, with Nebula’s help, drove the ship until it was right under Thanos’. Then, the human took over and, with a few button-pushing, landed straight on the other ship. “Now”, she said loud enough for everyone to hear, “we have to blow these walls up!”

She could swear she heard Quill complain about the damage on his past self’s ship, but ignored it as Rocket managed to open a big hole on both ships, allowing their entrance on Thanos’ one. She was the last to jump in; everyone had already begun to split up, but she knew where to go.

Gamora was at the end of the corridor, seemingly waiting for her. “Looking for someone?”, she said, facial expression unreadable.

“I think you know who”, she replied cautiously.

Her sister approached her and offered her hand. “My version of you died aiding her escape”, she said as Nebula took it. Then she pulled her closer, whispering in her ear, “She’s on her way to Asgard, in an untraceable escape pod.”

Nebula nodded. She trusted Gamora, even this version, to tell the truth. By 2014, her sister was no longer on their father’s side, and on this day she was about to run away from his control. “We’ll have to take over the ship to get there, though”, she admitted. “The one we used to get here is damaged beyond repair.”

“With the amount of help you brought”, Gamora replied, “it may not be hard.”

She was about to say that many powerful allies didn’t make it to the ship when a sling ring opened in front of them. “Strange”, she mumbled, and turned to Gamora. “Are you coming?”

“Of damn course. I lost my Nebula, and I’ve heard you lost your Gamora. Let’s be together again.” At that, she smiled, and both stepped into the ring.

A huge castle appeared in front of them. Turning back, she saw the others coming through other rings. “Good thing I planted an earpiece on all of you”, she heard Rocket say, and turned back ahead. “As soon as I heard Gamora give Y/N’s location away, I told the wizard here.”

“Then what are we waiting for?”, she heard Captain Rogers say.

“Nothing”, she replied. “Let’s get inside.”

Next

--------------------------

We’ll get back to reader’s POV in the next chapter, but there might be a scene told from Steve’s or Nebula’s eyes. I’m not sure yet.

Taglist (open!): @autobotgirl15-blog​ @starstrucknature @cheeseburgersstuff​ @aamzter2013

[chocktaw-salchow]

TRANSLATION: From Copenhagen to Longeuil

Laurence Fournier-Beaudry had to give up on the Pyeongchang Olympics after being denied Danish citizenship

By Alain Bergeron

A promise for a Canadian passport in 2020 for her partner Nikolaj Sorensen could allow Laurence Fournier-Beaudry to finally compete in the 2022 Olympic Games.

This is a translation of an article originally posted by Le Journal de Québec

Uncompromising, Denmark refused Laurence Fournier-Beaudry’s citizenship application, depriving her and her partner the opportunity to compete in the last Olympic Games.  With one path blocked, their only solution now is to go the opposite way: her partner Nikolaj Sorensen has been promised a passport in 2020 which gives them hope to finally compete at the Olympics in Beijing.

Canadian figure skating, full of dramatic stories, now gives us a tale that two lovers have been telling (weaving) for six years between Copenhagen and Longeuil.  After a mandatory year long break from all international competition, their necessary sacrifice will end the day after the Canadian championships in New Brunswick on January 21.

From this day forward, the ice dancers who qualified for the Pyeongchang Olympics but could not participate, will permanently leave behind the Danish flag for the Canadian one.  A top three finish at the national championships would lead them to the world championships in Japan in March and would mark their official entry into the Canadian team.

“When we are announced on the ice for the first time, it is going to be bizarre to hear ‘Competing for Canada’. But fundamentally, I have become almost as much Canadian as Danish,” admitted the 29 year old man with almost impeccable French.  

A reflection

January 21st, 2019 will be a exactly one year to the day since the end of the European Figure Skating Championships in Moscow where the duo finished 9th.  At that time, the imminence of the Pyeongchang Olympics provoked a reaction in the two.

Should they cut their ties with Denmark and opt for Canada, where Nikolaj’s assured citizenship would not compromise a possible Olympic qualification??  If yes, it would be necessary to accept the “penalty” of a year away from international competition, a rule dictated by the International Skating Union (ISU) to skaters wanting to compete for another country.

“We asked ourselves these questions.  Do we want to continue skating for a long time? Do we stop? We talked with the Danish federation who has always supported us and who always wanted the best for us.  They told us: we understand your problem and we will never get in your way,” recounts Nikolaj.

“It was a big decision to make,” added Laurence originally from the Greenfield Park neighborhood.

No compromise in Denmark

According to the ISU regulations, a couple is allowed to compete for a country even if only one of the two members have citizenship.  The rule applies to any international competition except the Olympic Games, where two passports from the same nation are required.

That is how Laurence, who accepted an offer to skate with a Danish skater who moved to Montreal two years earlier, was able to build an international career.  In the shadow of Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir who have skated in and won all of the worlds biggest competitions, Denmark served as a refuge to make the most of their talent in the field of ice dance.

In their fourth World Championship appearance in 2017, their 13th place finish made Denmark the seventh best country in the competition.  As a result they had qualified a spot to the Pyeongchang Olympics.

Their happiness however turned into frustration.  Despite many appearances before government officials, it was a wasted effort.  This Northern European country does not give out citizenship like a coffee ordered at a drive through.  There are no exceptions- not even for two Olympic level skaters who live and train in Montreal at the world renowned school of Marie-France Dubreuil and Patrice Lauzon.

“Even if you are married, but you don’t live and train Denmark for at least seven years, there are no exceptions.  It is up to 10 years if you are not married,” explained the Copenhagen native, who knows every comma of the law.

Canada, a natural choice

So the 2018 Olympic Games were off the table, likewise for 2022.  So naturally, Canada became the solution for their hope to compete at the Olympics, even if Laurence’s attachment to the Scandinavian country of her boyfriend would have justified representing them under the five rings.

“I would have liked that.  But between competing at the Olympics for Canada or for Denmark, lets say that’s I am happy with the decision that we made.  I realized that it’s fun to represent my own country.  The Canadian federation welcomed us with open arms.  It was a natural transition,” she reckoned.

The images of a Bell Center cheering them on at the World Championships in March 2020 could reinforce that sense of belonging.

Charmed by the Quebecois Identity

Nikolaj Sorensen remembers the reality that he presented Laurence Fournier-Beaudry with when he asked her to start a career with him in 2012 .  “I know that would cannot participate in the Olympic Games together because it will be impossible for you to obtain Danish citizenship.  Do you want to become a team anyways?”  Six years later, their dreams are reborn as Canadians.

Nikolaj Sorensen moved to Montreal in December 2010 at the age of 21 to pursue a career in figure skating.  Canada will not have to worry about if he belongs when he is granted his citizenship in August 2020.

Quebec even less

“When I first arrived, it was for the selfish reason of skating.  But I found it beautiful that little by little, I discover that Quebec is a little society in North America, an island, a unit where people speak french,” observed the Dane who now has the status of a permanent resident in Canada.

“It is sad to see the immigrants arriving here and not only don’t want to learn French, but seem to be resistant to it.  I know that this provokes a debate but we speak french here.  It’s not more complicated than that.  When I arrived, I appreciated that there was only one language here.  I find that cool, a little like in Denmark we speak Danish.”

We do hygge?

After six years of time spent with Danish people, both with her boyfriend’s family and with members of the national skating federation, Laurence Fournier-Beaudry can now follow a conversation in the unique language.  She notably learned a word that does not translate into any other language: hygge. Having hygge (pronounced “ugge”) is a very Danish value, where an indoors or outdoors activity becomes a reason to remember the joy of being together.  Whether it is a family evening in the lounge or a simple trip to the park, hygge provides a sense of wellbeing to the inhabitants of a country subjected to the harshness of their climate.

“It’s comforting.  To understand that time passes so quickly that we must say that we are happy to have what we do.  It’s nothing formal.  It’s just an activity to take time to appreciate life,” summarized the quebecois who has already assimilated the tradition.

Internal Rivalry

Adding this new world-class teen into the Canadian landscape raises the debate among the ice dance teams on the canadian national team.  Despite the retirement of two-time Olympic champions Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir, a new generation is here with Ontarians Kaitlyn Weaver & Andrew Poje and Piper Gilles & Paul Poirier, who were respectively 7th and 8th at the Pyeongchang Olympics.

Closer to home, there are also the quebecois Carolane Soucisse and her partner Shane Firus, who they see daily in training with Marie-France Dubreuil and Patrice Lauzon at the Gadbois Complex in Montreal.

“Carolane and Shane have known about our change for a long time and our relationship with them is still good.  That will not change.  Anyways, we have not come here to say that we are better.  Nikolaj and I, we aren’t those kind of people,” affirmed Fournier-Beaudry.

Back to the Source

They are forbidden from international competition until next January, but nothing is stopping the neo-Canadian team from Quebecois and Canadian competitions to find their bearings. If Skate Canada Challenge in Edmonton, from November 28 to December 2nd, will be a necessary step to qualify for the Canadian Championships, their presence at the Quebec Championships in Gatineau last week served to get rid of the rust and remaster the stress of competition.

[keys-stars]

10 Reasons You Should Travel

Traveling is one of the most thrilling and adventurous things to do. Why do people go on so many trips? Are there any opportunities to travel to many countries if you are in wheelchair? Sure! Here are the top 5 reasons to travel.

Before You Start

It is no secret that traveling is tiring and exciting. You must choose the most desirable destinations, book accommodations, tickets and also discover the top places to go to in the city you've chosen. If you're a student with a lot of work How do you handle all your academic work? You can hire someone to help you with your homework. It's now easy to complete all of your assignments by experienced writers and enjoy as much time as you need to travel with any limitations. You can choose to have an essay writer assist you in improving your academic performance. When you choose to find out the latest information about cosytravel, you must browse https://cosytravel.co.uk/ website.

The 10 Most Important Reasons You Should Consider Traveling

You'll be able to see the most beautiful places in a variety of countries around the globe, as well to learn about the culture and customs of other nations. It's an excellent opportunity to broaden your worldview. But what are other benefits of travel? Let's look!

Even if you have disabilities, traveling is far easier than you think.

A lot of places are now accessible for wheelchairs. It's now much easier to book hotels and plane tickets thanks to accessibility standards. You can also visit museums and theaters. If you are unsure about whether visiting other countries is a good idea for you, then you could start by traveling locally. It is also possible to visit nearby states or cities that are easily accessible via train or car. You can do a lot nearer to home if try a test drive!

You will discover a lot about yourself through travel.

What is your favourite food? What kind of entertainment do you feel most passionate about? It is possible that the things that you enjoyed before could give way to new tastes and sounds, as you travel. Visiting different museums, theaters or concerts, cafes and restaurants allows us to expand the range of our experiences and better settle the question of who we are. While traveling, you have a chance to discover the things you truly enjoy and dislike. Additionally, you will discover new interests, learn more about the cultures of different countries, and explore different kinds of activities.

Are you trying to learn an entirely new language? Immersion helps!

It's well-known that speaking native languages is the most effective method to learn foreign languages. You can hardly find crowds of native German, Spanish, French or Italian native speakers in your area. Traveling is a great way to learn new words and phrases, and also help you master foreign languages. If you'd like to start speaking any language with minimum effort, then traveling is the right decision to boost your proficiency. It is possible to instruct English when you travel as well, which is an excellent way to get acquainted with native speakers.

It's never too late to realize your dreams.

Do you want to be able to view the Coliseum or Eiffel Tower from your own eyes? Do you prefer to travel Paris or Rome in your 20s or later in life? There's a reason that says "there's no time like the present" - Think about it! What's the reason to put off? Get tickets now to the place you've always wanted to go.

It's always a thrill to travel.

Traveling is incredibly adventurous and is sure to enhance your life. If you travel to a different place, you will be able tell a few great stories. For example, you can visit some incredible events, concerts, or unique events that take place in a faraway place from where you live.

Traveling is a wonderful way to meet new people and make new acquaintances.

It's not just about going to new locations. It's about meeting new people. If you're a global traveler you'll get the chance to meet people from all over the world - and hopefully some or all of them could become great friends! Some lucky travelers have found the love of their lives when they traveled.

Travelers are happier.

Recent research shows that people who enjoy traveling are more happy than those who don't. Are you feeling down or frustrated? Are you struggling with negative feelings? Perhaps you are ready to make reservations for a different place. Travelers on a tight budget might also visit some new places that are located nearby by automobile.

There is no better way to relax than taking a break from school or work.

If you are a workaholic it is crucial to take a break and alter your environment from time to time. This will help you increase your productivity and offer you a lot of inspiration.

Every trip to a new destination provides you with the chance to discover more about history, culture, and much more.

When you visit the country of your choice it is common to delve into its history and traditions. You are aware of unusual events and other characteristics in other nations. This can help you broaden your worldview and learn more about yourself.

It makes us appreciate our home just a bit more.

The world is vastly diverse. You can see the world from different perspectives as well as enjoy your own home and be amazed by the beauty of it.

It's always worthwhile to travel. Let go of the negatives and benefits of visiting new places! Try to travel to the place you are passionate about and take advantage of all the advantages of travel.

[craftypeachmiracle]

Delivering one of the finest E-Commerce Localization Services across geographic boundaries

The very intention of E-commerce Localization is to provide international buyers an online shopping experience that is, no doubt, no different from their normal local experience. This move makes sure to the retailers to enhance their international sales as well as take part in fair and equal chance with local competitors,

 If E-commerce businesses want to scale up their reach globally, localization is a must. The ploy has a widespread influence, especially on the target audiences, and it enables it to be accessible to people across the globe. Oftentimes, it needs specific tools and special help to modify both software and content. 

 Let’s understand what is localization:

 Localization happens to be the de facto in today’s time and age. The barrier of language problems becomes the strongest impediment for expanding the business globally. Thanks, to the proliferation of the internet that has made it possible to communicate culturally different people with ebullient ease. It is the oxygen of business that helps to distribute your service across the length and breadth of the globe. It has subsequently cemented the loopholes in business augmentation cutting across geographic boundaries.

 There is no doubt that the universe moves with words. The easier to speak with customers having spoken in different languages, the better the prospects not only for the businesses but also to customers. The change of business dynamics has prompted many businesses to realize to provide their objectives transcend across boundaries. One of the most talked-about services is Localization. Simply put, Localization is the process of translating one language to another keeping a careful tab of cultural parity. These were the considerable stumbling block in earlier times.  

  The paramount importance of any business is to satisfy the customers' needs. There are innumerable Localization Service providers are there, but perhaps to satisfy the customers is not a mean task. At this particular juncture, Acadestudio is the best bait for E-commerce Localization Services. Their track record is quite impressive, and they have emerged as the leader in the realm of Localisation, Every shade of their services is at par with the global standard. 

 Flavors of Localization:

 Localization comes in different forms. The language predicament of business can be attenuated and establishes clarity and engagement between the parties. Let us taste the Flavors:

Application Localization Services:

These services help to localize all the contents of software keeping intact the cultural beauty while localization. Besides, It also examines whether the software is matching with the localization services.

Technical Localization Services:

 Generally, while perusing any technical content, it is laced with jargon that may baffle many readers. These services ease those tension and readers are in a position to lap it up in a better light.

 Medical localization Services: 

Nevertheless, its procedure is almost like a technical localization, the market size of medical is bigger than Technical. Therefore, technical understanding is helpful in this field.

 Online Localization Services:

 It is nothing but a Website localization. The benefit of doing that is to access a wide base of customers belonging to different parts of the world using their language and maintaining the cultural poise.

 Multimedia Localization Services:

It subsumes a wide spectrum of localization from video to audio, translate simple online text to professional induced imparting. All those come under the purview of Multimedia Localization.

  Literary Localization Services:

It is said that food is an integral part of the body and in the same vein literature is the staple diet for the human’s mind. This aforesaid corroborates the fact by having the finest stories stuff with emotions and intellect of humans. It provides books, novel, audio books that are abundant in the literary world, and you can simply cherish by getting them.

  A bagful of benefits using E-commerce Localization:

Following are some benefits of E-commerce Localization. Take a look:

 Able to reach a wider audience:

The adage is still very much in vogue that there is no substitute for hard work. In the same breath, putting untiring endeavors surely increases your customer base. For a long time, a visible stumbling block has hampered the progress of business expansion due to language barriers. With localization, things have become much easier now. The customers will be more connected and engaged if they find that the product information is given in their native language. That is the beauty of localization. There is confusion that translation and localization are the same. There exists a subtle difference. The translation is just like a word-by-word conversion from one language to another. Localization also translates content, but it infuses the cultural sensitivity of the respective region. Care ought to be taken so that it cannot digress from the original content.

 Connect your target audience in a better light:

Connect the audiences are one part but to retain them is the ultimate goal. A unique approach is needed to win their trust. Localization plays a significant role in that direction. There are many instances where users visit the site, but they quickly leave the site. It means they are not satisfied. It finds out that customers prefer the site in their own language. If you pay more attention to the international clients, they feel more at the home-like feeling. That is the trump card to pull them back in your site.

  Improve Customer Service:

A large chunk of activities goes to customer service. Many a time, customers are unhappy due to poor customer service. Localization helps them to talk in their native language. If the communications are not clear, you are, perhaps, unable to unearth customers' problems. The review section plays a sobering role, and customers' interest is influenced by the review rating. If the review rating is high, it is most likely that they would purchase the product and reverse may not always be encouraging. Word of mouth is another way to entice customers.

 Increase Revenue :

Increase revenue is at the forefront of any business. If you fail to increase your revenue, all your efforts come to naught. You ought to be confident enough that localization pays off handsomely for your E-commerce store. This move will be effective if you span out your business globally. If you provide a solution to the language barrier, it will open up a can of opportunities across the world. Trade cautiously when you are on the verge of entering a new country. A unique market requires a lot of hard work and creativity. In that respect, Localization plays a pivotal role, and at the same time, you pay a lot of attention to other aspects also. Therefore, localize your website properly, it is a sure-shot way to increase your revenue. 

 Keep alive your competitive edge: 

You are already in an advantage stage having effectively localized your E-commerce storefront globally. It is necessary to remain competitive in the face of cut-throat competitive E-commerce business. You never relegate to the recess of forgotten memory of customers. Ably assisted by marketing consultant and research, you will be surely alive with the customers, even on holidays. Localization helps you to move ahead on the road to success.

 In order to achieve success in the realm of E-commerce business, you need to have a trusted and accomplished E-commerce Localization.

  How Acadestudio mitigates those problems?

The rapid stride of E-commerce business is seen in today’s time. A natural desire on the part of the customers to buy international brands adds momentum to E-commerce localization. This has surged the demand for a trusted and accomplished E-commerce Localization Services that cater properly to the clients. 

Acadestudio, a seasoned campaigner for decades, has a pool of E-commerce experts who are the best in this trade. Our E-commerce professionals deliver the best E-commerce solution to clients. We pay great attention to every detail of E-commerce project and render flawless content to the delight of our clients. Our on-time delivery and unmatched pocket-friendly price are most sought-after.

[drapeau-rouge]

Interview with Debbie Mearns

This is an interview from the January 1979 issue of New Horizons: A Socialist Perspective for Youth, a magazine published the Young Communist League of Canada. [The Native Peoples’ Caravan was modelled on the On To Ottawa Trek (organized by the Communist Party of Canada and allies in 1935) and organized by a coalition of indigenous groups and allies, including Elder Vern Harper, Louis Cameron, AIM & the Ojibway Warriors Society, to deliver the Native Peoples’ Manifesto (a list of 10 demands) to the opening of the 30th Canadian Parliament. This was a period of rising indigenous activity, following the occupation of Anicinabe Park in Ontario and the road blockade at Cache Creek in British Columbia. The group started the voyage in Vancouver in mid September 1974 and arrived on September 30 to present the Manifesto and ask for an audience with Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. They were met with violence from the Canadian state. As one of the organizers Louis Cameron put it: “The RCMP had the guns, the bayonets and the tear gas: we had a drum and a sheet of paper with our demands.” The group of more than 200 was able to retreat to Victoria Island, unceded Algonquin Territory, to establish the Native Peoples’ Assembly.] Debbie Mearns, a law student at UBC, is currently the president of the Vancouver Indian Centre. She has, in the past number of years, worked on major campaigns that have advanced specific demands of native peoples in Canada and the United States. In 1974 she was one of the organizers of the Native Peoples’ Caravan to Ottawa. In 1976 she worked on the Leonard Peltier Committee that was seeking to stop his extradition to the United States. Debbie has also been involved with the American Indian Movement (AIM). In August and July of this year, she was a delegate to the 11th World Festival of Youth and Students in Havana, Cuba.

New Horizons: What impressed you about the festival?

DM: It was meeting people from all over the world in a country that has achieved socialism for the first time in the Americas. I was especially impressed by the delegates from the socialist countries. They were very informed about the native movement in North America. A native woman from Siberia knew of events taking place in the Northwest Territories with respect to land claims. I was, however, already familiar with their knowledge of our people when, in 1976, a Soviet ship docked in Vancouver and the first question they asked me was: ‘What about Leonard (Peltier)?’ I was amazed because it was so different from here. One can talk to people in Canada and find them unaware of there ever having been a Native Peoples’ Caravan to Ottawa when at the time it was front page news. It was the first time that the riot squad had been used in Canada, a special division of the RCMP equipped with helmets, tear gas, clubs, leaded gloves, chest protectors, etc.

NH: What were some of the things you were specifically involved in when in Havana?

DM: A woman from Radio Havana approached me for a broadcast interview, which I accepted. It was exciting to go with her and have the opportunity to speak on the struggles of the native peoples in Canada to a listening audience of Cubans, themselves respected internationally for their revolutionary struggles.

NH: And what were the struggles you spoke of over Radio Havana?

DM: Firstly, the struggle of native peoples to achieve just settlements for land claims. Due to the strong stand taken by the Dene and the Inuit, their settlements in the Northwest Territories will set a precedent for other settlements yet to be negotiated.

A strong negotiating structure has been set up and a firm grass roots foundation has been laid by educating and politicizing the peoples that live there. Another important part of laying that foundation was when the peoples of the Northwest Territories realized that they were not alone, and that the labour movement was eminently approachable.

The control of development in the north is not a selfish demand by the native peoples; it is a demand which also has to be used as a tool whereby Canadians are made to look critically at northern development and where the profits repeated by such developments are going. After the James Bay settlement ‘disaster’, which was modelled after the Alaska agreement (1971), the Dene and Inuit of the Northwest Territories decided to change the pattern. The Alaska agreement, by the way, was pushed through Congress and became infamous for being the most complicated treaty ever devised. There are about one hundred native people who have a basic understanding of the treaty, and each of these people need a lawyer to interpret its various clauses. Following the James Bay settlement, the Yukon Indians decided to make their demands on the federal government and not the other way around. It was the first time that land claim settlements began before rather than after development had begun. It was the first time that native people had presented to the government what they felt should be included in the settlement.

The people of James Bay negotiated with a gun to their head, given that development was already going on. They simply had unequal bargaining power. They were never approached about land settlements by the government until the government and business had ‘development’ on their minds. And it was only when the Indians of James Bay decided to fight did the federal and Quebec governments decide to negotiate claims that were long overdue.

NH: What have the Indians of James Bay lost?

DH: They were forced to settle for a small amount of land, for instance, they only own the land immediately surrounding their villages. It heralded the back-to-the-reserve mentality of the government unfortunately. They also gave up the land on which they trapped though they were given certain rights for trapping. James Bay, to put it more succinctly, is now broken up into three land categories: firstly, there is the reserve land; secondly, there are those lands not under development and on which the Indians have some right to hunt on. However those rights are subject to the federal governments’ right to develop that land if and when development has been decided on, therefore making the Indians’ hunting rights null and void. They were assured that further development on those lands would be ‘for the good of society as a whole.’ Thirdly, there is the land development for the James Bay hydro-electric project, and needless to say, it is the major chunk.

The James Bay settlement is different from the Alaska settlement because the native peoples in Alaska, along with selling their rights to land, have sold their special status as native people. After the year 1991 they will be considered just ordinary American citizens. So, in that sense, the James Bay settlement is a better one relatively speaking, in that they still have Indian status as well as the attendant legal privileges. The Alaska agreement gave a settlement of 500 million dollars which works out to 181 dollars per person for 12 years.

NH: What was the year of the Alaska agreement?

DM: 1971, five years before the Berger report. The Alaska agreement was heralded as the agreement in North America. It was the new approach by the governments of Canada and the US in dealing with Indians, a ‘model’ for any further negotiations. One must also remember that Alaska was non-treaty, a forgotten area until oil was found. The Dene of the Northwest Territories thought their treaty was a peace treaty, not a give-away of land. One man in the Territories ‘signed’ the treaty but was not there the day it was signed. The Dene were amazed when they were told what they had actually signed.

Wayne Clark & Debbie Mearns at the Vancouver Indian Centre. July 9, 1979 

NH: How would you wish to see the lands in the north developed? What are the alternatives?

DM: I look at the treatment of native peoples in Siberia as a living example of the only alternative one can taken when developing northern lands where indigenous peoples make their lives. There, development has not disrupted their lifestyle but enhanced it. The native Indians of Siberia have developed strong renewable resources along the lines of their culture. A native trapper can earn as much as a highly paid technician in the Soviet Union. A written language has been developed for the natives of Siberia by the Soviet Union which can encompass modern ideas as well as traditional ones. They even have their own universities. Siberia, a republic of the Soviet Union, should be used in Canada as a ‘model’ (Berger felt similarly), because it preserves a culture and a people without leaving them in the past. Land claims will not be treated correctly in a capitalist system.

NH: Besides the land settlements, what other injustices do you wish to bring to our attention?

DM: The fact that there has been sterilization of native Indian women for years is something that many Canadians and Americans are unaware of. But that is not surprising that no one has heard of it before a native woman in the US provided documented evidence to the effect that this was going on. Her name is Connie Redbird Yuri. It was encouraging that many people in the Canadian delegation approached me after they had heard me speak to other delegates. They were concerned and wanted to find out more about native issues in Canada. This is one way to overcome the ignorance our government wishes us to remain trapped in.

NH: What did you think of the composition of the Canadian delegation in respect to the Indians represented there?

DM: I felt that the natives in the delegation were small in number, though there had been more of an effort this year than in others to make it larger. I wished that there could have been wide-ranging meetings between indigenous peoples of North and South America at the Festival. Last fall there was a conference held in Geneva to discuss the mutual problems of indigenous peoples and the best way to solve them. Countries were allowed to sit in but not to participate. At that conference there was unity amongst the Indians of North and South America for the first time.

NH: What do you think that the Festival specifically accomplished for the native peoples from North America represented there?

DM: The Festival was instrumental in educating our people to understand that they are not alone, not hopelessly isolated. During the Festival we were brought into contact with liberation movements from around the world, thus giving us the feeling that we were, in one sense, a liberation movement ourselves. We had contact with people who are struggling for similar rights against the same imperialist enemies.

Debbie Mearns with Christine Price, strike leader of indigenous employees at a march pushing the Muckamuck Restaurant to negotiate a first contract with their Service, Office and Retail Workers of Canada union. August 12, 1978.

NH: How do we build on the gains made for the native peoples at both the conference in Geneva and the Festival in Cuba?

DM: By educating the people in Canada that we exist and that we have problems. And the Communist Party of Canada has been the only party to advance a realistic and principled program for solving those problems we have talked of. It would be very appropriate for the party to make Native Indian issues a much more active priority in its program that ever before. Indians living in Canada are the lowest on the economic scale, in fact they are the lowest in every area of life in this country. Indians have the highest unemployment rate in Canada (57-90%), the highest mortality rate, the largest number in prisons, the highest suicide rate, the shortest life expectancy (38 yrs.), the highest rate of TB, etc.

Although there are somewhat scattered progressive forces in Canada, it can be overcome. There was solidarity in Havana, there will be solidarity in Canada - solidarity with the French Canadians, with native peoples. Native Indians have been purposefully isolated from the working class for too long. And it is vitally important for native Indians to realize that we face the same enemies as do the working people of Canada, both French and English. The slogan of the Festival is pertinent to our bi-national country: anti-imperialist solidarity, peace, and friendship.

NH: Then I’m sure that being in Cuba was not only a concrete act of solidarity but a symbolic one as well.

DM: Yes. The feeling of being in Cuba was special because Cuba threw off the yoke of US imperialism. It proved to the world that liberation revolutions can succeed on the very doorstep fo the US and not only that, but they will succeed for all of the Western hemisphere. To be in Cuba where there is no racism and where there is a total internationalist view of the world was very important for us all. It did not matter that Canada is cutting financial aid to Cuba or that the US is still upholding the blockade of Cuba, there was nothing but warmth and friendship for the participants of the Canadian and US delegations.

NH: Do you have a final comment, Debbie?

DM: As a native person I have experienced something never to be forgotten in my life. I met comrades from Angola, Palestine, Cuba, South America, the Soviet Union, and many other countries, and just by human contact with those people and seeing Fidel and the love people have for him, inspired me beyond words.

[neonlaynes]

I was actually tagged on my main but I’ll just copy it here WAHAHA

get to know more meme under the cut! it was fun to do and maybe (definitely, tbh) offers more insight on me as a person rather than just another local art peddler....lol.......

1. What is the favourite item of clothing you own?

god I really.......it’s soooo hard to choose between my regular clothing and my lolita wardrobe but I’d have to say my daydream carnival tiered JSK in ivory....it’s got such a gorgeous pastel palette and I could stare at the print for days!!

2. Tell me about the first time you watched your favourite movie?

do....do I even have one?! I think I have many....but a super memorable experience was in high school junior? senior year? where we had to read the great gatsby for class and it was coincidentally the year that the baz luhrmann adaptation came out so I went and watched it together with my friends. breathtaking visuals that I absolutely will not forget, especially the scene with 9000 flowers and the silk rain scene. we watched it a second time too, but that time we sat in the Very Front Row so our necks hurt afterwards from looking up and seeing everything at an extreme angle HAHA

3. What was the last book you finished?

it is soooo awful (to myself, if anyone shares this sentiment then welcome to the club) that the only true reading I’ve done these years are textbooks and fanfiction. I cannot for the life of me recall when I’ve read an Actual Book and I hopefully can change that eventually!!

4. What is the next book you want to read?

I am Totally Open to recs but I’m probably going to finally get to reading the myriad of design and art books that I got last year ;;;

5. When is your birthday, and what do you want for it this year? (If your birthday has already happened this year, did you get what you had your heart set on?)

oct 12! I am sadly very materialistic and impulsive and I tend to get the things that I want myself, so. I’ll go abstract and say maybe a sense of direction or something along those lines haha!! feeling like I haven’t stagnated for the past few years and being able to feel in control of what may come would be lovely. please I am quite desperate!!!

6. If you were given one month and $10,000, where would you travel to?

either japan because although I’ve been there, I feel I didn’t fully enjoy the beauty of the culture and especially the nature of the area (I went to tokyo) so I’d love the chance to go again!

OR!! a europe exploration trip with focus on italy! getting my minor in italian and it’d be a shame to not experience the rich culture of italy at least once in my life, but also bc I hear that it’s pretty economical to travel around while in europe and I might as well visit the other lovely countries!!

7. Cake or pie?

Cake!! I adore cheesecake!! literally whenever I go someplace and they have cheesecake I HAVE to eat and taste it I love comparing them... I actually hardly ever eat desserts but also catch me eating fondant abominations and LIKING IT!!!!!!!

8. Name 3 things you think you’re really good at.

hyperfixation (on a MEANINGLESS task like searching for a post buried underneath several layers of Hell, on a fandom/pairing, etc.)

retail therapy!!! you feel bad??? don’t worry!!! ADD TO CART!! CHECKOUT!!!

Art (one of my Only Skills bc I kept building on it and ignoring everything else so I’m Kinda Decent)

9. Name 3 things you’d like to be better at.

Focusing on the Right Things. it’s ridiculously hard to get me excited/passionate on something especially if it’s to do w academics so I Always procrastinate and never put 100% effort into things and even though it’s my last quarter in uni I want to see Some Modicum of change

Making friends and being social.........it’s not good to compare myself to others but I’m still rly beat up over not being able to be charismatic enough to Attract people but I also spend most my time worrying about social cues anyways so uhm?? spend less time Thinking and more time Doing!!!!!!

Art. I’d really like to see where the next years will take me art-wise. still don’t know what I want to focus on like painting, or developing my style, or just.......revisiting the fundamentals but it’s gonna happen y’all!!

10. Name 3 far-fetched dreams you’d like to do someday.

be Completely Fluent in Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Italian. I’m Chinese-American and I’m woefully inept in that I can speak like a native and pretty much comprehend most things but I’ve got the literacy and handwriting of an elementary school kid and BOYYY I am Truly Regret at this age, just like my mom said I would be, at not spending more time with my mother tongue. also ngl I fking love language and it’d be great to complete that East Asian Trifecta and be able to not have too much of a problem traveling in those countries. Italian I actually took because fresh out of high school I had a brief infatuation with assassin’s creed, namely II, and on a Damn Whim, I chose to take italian in college instead of japanese which was my high school language course that I took up til honors. REALLY ENJOY IT THOUGH, NO REGRETS HERE FOR ONCE!!!

Travel to the places that you see in nature documentaries...like what an EXPERIENCE that would be!! esp waterfalls?! beaches?! sightings of unique species?! okay actually now that I think about it this is going to involve a lot of camping stuff which I am painfully not ready for but would be willing to prepare for.....worth it though!! I just (clenches fist) really love nature

this isn’t so much a dream but like......Finding the One and not being in a loveless relationship/marriage. I don’t rly have any place to say this considering I haven’t dated Anyone ever at the ripe old age of 21 going on 22 but like a kid, I can still fantasize abt being with someone in a textbook romance,I hope. kind of Deathly Scared of becoming what they call in China “leftover women” who can’t find a partner and end up being single well into their late 30s ;; and since I’m gonna be out of college and graduated there’s even less chance to meet someone unless I Actively throw myself into shit which I am notoriously!! bad at!!! so that is a Saga for another time.......

11. If you had to dye your hair, what colour would you dye it?

PINK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I just wish dyeing hair didn’t mean signing off your hair quality to a death sentence (I am aware there’s methods/products you can use to make it better but... AAAAA) I’ve bleached my hair before and Already it was significantly.....Sadder

if you made it here I applaud you and appreciate you!!!! thanks for listening to meeeee

[missizzy]

Fic: The Far-Flung Agent, Part 3

(Read entire work on AO3)

It took about a day and half to lay the devices about the back half of the island, and then return the ship to an easy point from where Stephen and Bonden could make landfall for a second time. During it Stephen listened as best he could to the words of the hands. The excitement over the affair of the lantern seemed to have died down a little, but despite his best efforts, the false story of the plague managed to get out, and, naturally, be believed as true, and not everyone was so confident that no one on board had it. Although the anxiety over this distracted the sailors enough that if anyone managed to hear of Jack’s dispute with the French captain over his possibly being paroled and put ashore, they did not see it worth talking about.

That he remained, of course, could not help but be noticed, especially when Jack made the decision to parole everyone else. “There are several neutral countries that have plenty of merchantmen in the area,” he told Stephen. “We shall approach one of those and let them take the men into the island’s harbour. It is not how I would like to do these things normally, of course, but the truth is I am uneasy about this whole matter, and about having both this captain and his crew on board.”

"I agree,” said Stephen. “Best to have him separated from them. Though I do tell you, brother, I have thought about it further, and whatever his reasons for wanting to be kept here, I am glad we are keeping him here, and under our eyes, for I still cannot guess as what secret plans he may have, or what it is he is not telling us.”

On the other hand, le Feulipe was there to watch the devices be dropped, with many exclamations and much marveling, and more than a few questions, which made Stephen glad there was literally no one on board who was even capable of answering them. Whether the captain was driven by more than mere enthusiastic curiousity he was uncertain; he genuinely did seem to be a very inquisitive man.

At least the excitement of the whole matter seemed to exhaust him, and like many of the Europeans who had lived for an extended amount of time in the hotter places of the world, he was prone to following the local custom of staying below cover and resting himself at midday when possible, and Stephen was quite certain he was asleep when Jack gave the order to put out the boat. Though he feared either this stay on the island, or a likely subsequent one, would be too long to keep much of its nature concealed from him.

It was hot indeed at midday, enough so that Stephen even felt a little concern for Bonden, whose breathing was far too heavy when at last he had the boat rowed ashore. “You ought to keep yourself covered again,” he said to him before leaving, “if only for concealment, and if you do not snore, which I do not believe you do, to spend the rest of this day asleep would not be a bad plan. If I am not back by nightfall, however, I would advise you to return to the Surprise. I will not come back here, except at midday.”

He thought it likely Bonden would have liked to protest this first part. Possibly the second part, as well. But as the only man on board ship besides Jack who was aware of the nature of Stephen’s usual activities ashore, although he very rarely came to know exactly what they entailed, he had, it seemed, resigned himself to the surgeon’s foolish behavior with relative cheer, and he agreed with only the admonishment, “If you disappear on us for more than a few days, I cannot answer for what the captain will do.”

Stephen wished such a warning was not necessary; in spite of his gratitude the one time Jack had come to rescue him, when the French had captured and tortured him in Port Mahon, he would never be happy at the notion of his risking his own life that way. “If I do not come back before then,” he therefore said to him, “I promise I will come back in five days.”

The heat was perhaps starting to fade when he reached the main town, and the inhabitants were starting to come back out to resume the day’s business. Nonetheless, Stephen reached the adobe of Mrs. Rothschild undisturbed, even if he noticed more than one curious native looking at him as he knocked on the door.

“Hey, about time you got here,” said Mr. Stiles as he answered the door. “We’re about to head off to endure the governor. Unexpected invite. She’ll probably want you to go with us now-maybe you should’ve dawdled a bit.”

“Is the governor really so unpleasant a man? I believe the office has recently changed hands.”

“Yeah, and not for the better, let me tell you. Especially since the guy who held it before we knew how to deal with. Jeremie Traque is a crazy man who likes to chase very young native women and harass us at every turn.”

“Jack!” Mrs. Rothschild had emerged; Stephen was impressed by how well she was dressed. “Why are you talking like that with Dr. Maturin with the door not even fully closed?”

“Fine, fine, fine!” The two men retreated from the door, and it was safely shut, although Stephen had not been worried anyway; no one else had been very near it, and the two of them had been talking quietly. “As I was telling the doctor here, we weren’t expecting to have to go see His Royal Not-So-Excellency today, and I suppose if you want people to believe you’ve got one of your crazy family members come to town, he should probably tag along. Pity we don’t have time to think up a really good identity for him.”

“A Catalan cousin, obviously,” mused Mrs. Rothschild. “One who perhaps does not speak the best French, English, or any language other than his own. I am sure you must know, Dr. Maturin, how much of an advantage it is when others do not think you can understand them, and are irritated when people mangle your own tongue. Within an hour they will all give up on any attempts to speak to you, and then because of that their attention on you will be lax.”

“Wait a minute,” said Jack. “You’re not telling me he’s going to be the one to go looking into the other rooms of the mansion? That’s my job!”

“That is normally your job only because as my attache, you are the person our hosts tend to pay less attention to of the two of us, and we usually do not have any third parties on hand to do it for us. Even so, you are hardly the most discreet man at reconnaissance that I have seen, and I am certain Dr. Maturin will be better at it.”

“You don’t even…” Mr. Stiles started, but something in Mrs. Rothschild face seemed to illustrate to him that any further argument would be fruitless. “Fine then, have it your way. You better be good at this, doctor.”

He gave Stephen a detailed description of the governor’s mansion, including a couple of secret rooms he’d discovered over the years, while Mrs. Rothschild went off, and came back with a coat and boots far fancier than the ones Stephen had been wearing. They were also a touch large on him, which he thought would be a hindrance if he was required to run or walk very fast while wearing them. “I do wish I had a good wig,” she said, “but we have had none in the house ever since Jack threw them out.”

“I told you, that wasn’t me!”

“I shall bring my own next time, if you wish it,” Stephen offered. He suspected it would not quite fit the image Mrs. Rothschild wanted their foes to have of him, but it would at least be something.

“That will do,” she said. “For today, we will say you dropped it into the sea-I imagine it has the scent of the sea, like the rest of you does, more or less.”

As they went out, Mr. Stiles and Mrs. Rothschild kept up with each other the kind of crossness that Stephen soon came to realize they both were, in fact, enjoying, especially when he made a comment about her and her disguises that Stephen did not think many men he knew would ever make to a lady of Mrs. Rothschild’s standing, and though she countered his words with her own, she clearly felt no offense at them. The natives they passed did not even raised their heads at their audible squabbling; Stephen suspected those who lived near them had often seen this sight before.

The new governor, however, did look a little perturbed, when they came to his mansion to find him unexpectedly waiting for them outside in the heat, and the two of them were so absorbed in their dispute over what he had said to the previous governor during their final interview with him that they were nearly upon him when she saw saw him there, hastily broke off the lengthy sentence she had been in the middle of, and cried out, “You Excellency! I hope we have not keep you waiting out in the heat for very long!” She and Mr. Stiles turned to face him, while Stephen kept his position behind them both and tried to make it look like he did not comprehend their words.

Governor Traque took the three of them in, and continued to look confused. “Ah, excuse me,” she continued. “I believe you have already met my man, Mr. Stiles, and this,” she stepped aside and Stephen stepped forward and offered his hand, “is my cousin, Senor Esteban el Agujetas. I am afraid he does not speak English or French; in fact, he speaks only Catalan Spanish.”

��Salutations.” The governor took Stephen’s hand while showing no sign of suspicion, though his face was still that of a man who was more likely than not to mean trouble for anyone in the world who might want something contrary to what he himself wanted. There was something wolfish about it, especially when he smiled. Stephen continued to feign lack of understanding, until Mrs. Rothschild said in Catalan, “This is the governor, Esteban,” and Stephen rapidly nodded and mumbled, “Ah, si, si,” while deliberately shaking the man’s hand much more aggressively than was called for. Pity it was a bad idea to try to cause an arm injury.

“Tell him I am most pleased to meet him,” the governor grinned, “and I am looking forward to hearing all the details. There is a story going around about a much-feared British man-of-war lurking around our island, and that one ship has already been taken; I’m sure he’d heard of such a thing.”

This would be a problem, Stephen thought, if this man was really determined to talk to him. But when Mrs. Rothschild had spoken a full translation, he said, in Catalan, “The ship I was on did not hear of such a thing, and indeed, as far as I can tell my voyage was a dull one, although I am afraid I suffered so from seasickness that I was constantly in my cabin, and found myself not even equal to asking anyone for news on most days.”

He was fairly confident his pale pallor would lead the governor to believe him easily vulnerable to any ailments he might claim, but the guffaws that came from the man in response were a less than pleasant surprise. His next few words were comprehensible to absolutely no one at all, and when he spoke coherent English again, it was to say, “Not used to the sea, are you? You must come from the inner lands of Catalunya, but even then, have you truly never been on it in your life?”

It was unlikely, Stephen supposed, that this man knew the first thing about Catalunya. That was likely further to their advantage. When the question was translated, he answered, “Once before, but I am afraid the seasickness is constant with me, and there is nothing to be done. As you can imagine, I did not have an easy journey out here.”

Mrs. Rothschild translated this, then added her own words, “I do not think you wish to hear that story, Your Excellency.”

“Oh no, definitely not,” Mr. Stiles chimed in. “We had to sit through it yesterday, and it put us off our dinner completely.”

“No, perhaps not. Shall we go in?”

The governor’s mansion was a bit grandiose and expensive for such a small island, although it was not necessarily maintained very well; Stephen’s sharp eyes picked out telltale signs on the walls and even a few indentations on the floor, although they were all covered discreetly by rugs. There was one place he even noticed Mrs. Rothschild very carefully pick her shoes over; she, clearly, had long taken note of this, and she and Mr. Stiles had probably also used it to their advantage many a time.

Unfortunately they were the only guests calling, and the Governor soon had the four of them seated, and said, “You have received a letter, Mrs. Rothschild, from the Empress. I am afraid it was most disgracefully handled by some people who wished to intrude upon her correspondence, and came into my possession, and opened already.”

“To me?” Mrs. Rothschild appeared to be genuinely astonished, though Stephen could detect the tiniest note of suspicion she failed to hide. “You speak of the Empress Marie Louise, I presume, but I cannot think of a reason she should write to me. I do not know how she even knows my name!”

“Well, beg pardon, of course, but the letter being opened my eyes did fall upon some of what was written in it. She said she was writing to you as someone whom her husband had told her might have been in her place.”

“Yeah, right,” said Mr. Stiles, “Like the Emperor would ever have treated her with that level of respect. It actually is true he tried to marry her a decade back, but-”

The Governor exclaimed his amazement in French; Stephen was equally shocked. He wished he could dare demand the story, but it was not a good idea to let the governor know he was ignorant of such a significant chapter in her family’s history.

“It was not so great an event as you think,” Mrs. Rothschild insisted. “He would never have taken me off this island, and while we did even begin a wedding ceremony, ultimately when the Dragoon showed up to call a halt to it, and succeeded, he let me go.”

“He treated her disgracefully,” said a much louder Mr. Stiles. “It was all about how he’d destroy England if she didn’t do everything he said. Imagine if you’d had to live the rest of your life that way, Ems.” His anger was obviously genuine and deep, that of a man who cared for a woman possibly more than he even cared for himself. Stephen was aware that this, also, was a bad sign from the viewpoint of British intelligence, but still he could not help but be comforted by it, purely for Mrs. Rothschild’s sake.

“In any event,” she said, “the Dragoon managed to rescue me with no harm done.” The warmth and amusement in her smile as she said this would’ve been understandable enough, of course, for two people referring to a secret they were keeping from someone they were talking with, although it was also an interesting contrast given how much they had been bickering during the past hour. “I believe I shall read this when I am back at home. Tell me, Governor, have you ever heard from the Empress yourself?”

“I saw her once,” he said eagerly, before beginning a lengthy account of the day he had seen the Empress from afar, shortly after her wedding to Bonaparte, including such details as which lady’s hat he’d accidentally jostled, and what she had said to him, and whose dog had startled him. Mrs. Rothschild encouraged him in such details, making such an impression of avid eagerness, and he was still telling the story an hour later, when Stephen gave a tiny groan and leaned forward. “Are you all right, sir?” the governor asked anxiously, as Mrs. Rothschild asked the same in Catalan.

“I…” Stephen stood and made a show of being tired and cramped up. “I think I could do with some fresh air.” When Mrs. Rothschild translated his words, the Governor nodded, and let him go.

He could give himself at least ten minutes, possibly twenty, although Stephen initially headed back towards the entrance of the mansion. He had spotted fairly near it signs of an entrance to one of the hidden stairways used by the servants, and when he slipped through it, thankfully none of the servants were actually using it at that moment. Mr. Stiles’ description of the mansion included details on all of its backstairs; he himself had used them plenty of times. Within five minutes of the most rapid walk he could manage, Stephen had exited into the corridor adjoining the Governor’s office, and when he reached the door he found it had not been locked.

The study was richly decorated, its desk quite large and covered with papers that did not look very well arranged. A glance over them initially did not reveal anything that looked unusual; most of them appeared to be what one would expect on a French governor’s desk. Stephen did spot one letter with the Emperor’s seal, but when he read it, he found it short and full of very general words, typical for a new governor. He supposed anything more unusual would probably be in the locked cabinet adjoining the desk, which was unfortunate, as he lacked the time to break into it, even had he been willing to leave evidence of an intruder having been in the study.

But when he was putting it down in the exact spot he had found it, he noticed underneath three pieces of paper was a fourth that appeared to have writing on the side of it facing downward. Still not thinking that necessarily meant anything, he carefully pulled it out and looked at it.

On top of it was a symbol he had never seen before, and below was a letter written in Dutch, with French words written clumsily below in what looked like the governor’s attempt to translate it. Dutch was not a language Stephen could read without effort, so instead he took a few minutes to read the French words and commit them to memory. There were enough he could get a general idea of what the message was about: it sent salutations to both the governor and Napoleon Bonaparte, and offered them the support of great warriors. The signature was in Japanese script.

He replaced it as close to the position he had found it in as he could, shifting the exact same papers over it. Then he hurried out and back the way he came.

They had confirmation of their main fear, except that Stephen could not help but feel the sending of such a letter to this governor was odd. From what he could tell of the language they had used, they’d seemed to have no clear idea of who the man was, even though they knew the title of his position, and that they might think him a much more important man than he actually happened to be. To some extent some false impressions and ignorance made sense for people living in a country cut off from the world, but there had also been a mention of Australia as a “small” place, and if they were attempting to sail anywhere, they ought to know it was not. At the very least, they likely hadn't yet made concrete plans for their voyage.

Once again he was fortunate enough to run into none of the servants on the backstairs, nor was anyone in the foyer when he emerged into it. Quick walking brought him back to the drawing room, though he was careful to slow down before his footsteps were likely to be identified. “You were quite some time,” Mrs. Rothschild observed to him in Catalan. “We were even thinking about taking our leave of here.”

“It was hotter outside than I anticipated,” he answered, and sat down as she translated their words for the governor’s benefit.

“If it is,” said the governor when he had heard them, “perhaps you don’t need to leave so soon.”

“I am sorry,” said Mrs. Rothschild, “but I have business this afternoon that truly must be seen to. It has been a pleasure.”

The walk back was quick and quiet, and Stephen used it to study his two companions as best he could manage without making himself obvious. There was not much to observe; theirs was mostly the easy silence of two people who had spent a decade in each other’s pockets and were at least momentarily in harmony with each other. But he did take not at one point when his eyes flicked towards her, and she tilted her head slightly, and slight twitches of his lips and eyebrows gave away further silent communication from her. Careless for a spy, on his part. Although he could not merely from this determine what they might be communicating about.

Down in her laboratory, Stephen recounted to his two companions what he had seen. Mrs. Rothschild insisted on writing it all down, although she was quick to reassure him the notes would never leave the laboratory, and the means of disposing of them within seconds if necessary were available. He watched her and Mr. Stiles survey her finished notes together, though they did not seem to attempt any more communication without him noticing; their eyes remained fixed on the papers, and when he managed to glimpse their hands he did not see them do more than handle the pages. She finished reading first, he very shortly after. “Don’t think it’s anyone we’ve run into here before,” he said.

“No,” she agreed. “Which means we still have too little information to do much with. Except…it might be a mistranslation, of course, but it sounds like they will arrive in more than one ship, and possibly not all at once. No small army, obviously.”

They also read through the letter from the Empress Marie Louise, but if there was to be anything of significance to be noted in it, they did not identify it on that day. She claimed to have heard Mrs. Rothschild’s name from one of the older servants, which was not implausible, and to simply be intrigued over the fact that her husband had been so determined to marry a proud Englishwoman, which was also plausible, but less likely. “I shall send her a response,” said Mrs. Rothschild. “Something short and harmless, not too encouraging.”

“You sure you don’t want to be friends with an Empress?” grinned Mr. Stiles. “It’d be useful, for one thing.”

“If she was married to another Emperor,” said Mrs. Rothschild, “but I would greatly rather that Bonaparte never received any unnecessarily reminder of my name for all the rest of his days.” That, of course, was understandable enough on her part.

The rest of the day passed without event. Stephen soon decided there was not an immediate reason not to return to the Surprise the following day Mrs. Rothschild happily ordered her cook to prepare dinner for three. While they ate, they entertained each other were the more harmless stories from their lives, and Stephen learned a great deal about the history of the East Indies, as well as America up to 1801. Mrs. Rothschild, as it happened, had not been entirely lying when she had told the governor she had business, though it involved meeting someone later in the evening. She and Mr. Stiles went out together, but as she was convinced the merchant she was meeting with was truly nothing other than what he claimed to be, Stephen elected to stay behind, saying he wished to go to bed early.

When they were gone, and he was certain none of the servants were watching, he carefully snuck up the stairs to the master bedroom.

He had not examined it for very long before he was satisfied that Mrs. Rothschild did not sleep in her bed alone. Between the bedclothes and the frame he found several stands of hair too dark to be hers. Most of the items in her closet were feminine, but in one corner they lay a stocking obviously made for the leg of a man. When he breathed in deep enough, he caught the lingering smell of sexual congress, recently conducted, likely only the previous night.

He lingered just a little longer, looking in the drawers and at Mrs. Rothschild’s papers. One was locked, with the key not in the room. He thought that must contain all her more sensitive documents, because he could not find any of them anywhere else. Instead she had records of her and her late husband’s shipping business, some scientific notes and sketches of devices, including the ones he had taken back to the Surprise, and a few miscellaneous materials, such as papers with Chinese lettering on them that were obviously her practice papers from learning how to read and write the script. Stephen regretted then he himself was not better versed in it.

The only real surprise was the lack of papers from Mr. Stiles anywhere in the drawers, when he had found none, sensitive or otherwise, downstairs either. It was a possibility he was one agent who burned everything he wrote upon, even if he wrote nothing that had to do with his spy work. But he did not seem to Stephen to be that type of man at all. More likely, he thought, he was instead a man who did not write very much. He had not struck Stephen as at all Mrs. Rothschild’s equal intellectually, though certainly he had to possess cunning, and all those particular gifts of mind.

When he had retreated downstairs to the drawing room, he briefly sat and contemplated whether it might not be impossible to get Mr. Stiles to defect. He clearly had a romantic image of himself, one that could very possibly override his loyalty to his country if pressed, and if he was genuinely attached to Mrs. Rothschild, the idea of defecting for love might be made to appeal to him. Or his image of himself could be of a man who would never let a woman persuade him to do such a thing, or, when brought to think of it, would expect her to do it rather than himself.

It was too risky, he decided, to even make the suggestion to Mrs. Rothschild. She might decide to bring it up to Mr. Stiles without being thoroughly sure he would not have the wrong reaction, too desperate to believe in the easiest way out. He needed to observe them further, preferably in a situation where they believed themselves to be alone.

He lingered a little longer in the drawing room after his decision was made. Mrs. Rothschild had an impressive library, and while more books in it than not were about mechanics, she also had some tomes on the native flora and fauna of both Australia and the East Indies. Stephen spent the better part of an hour reading about Caledonian birds, and was in the middle of a fascinating passage about kagus when he heard Mrs. Rothschild and Mr. Stiles return. He did not immediately move from where he sat, but he ceased reading, letting the book stay open with his eyes no longer focused on it, while he instead attempted to discern what they were saying.

Mr. Stiles was talking much more loudly than Mrs. Rothschild, so initially Stephen heard only his replies: “…don’t think he has the brains for that.” “Please, can you stand to be around him that much? He doesn’t even know anything about machines the way that other guy did.” “No, that’s the one where if we ever see him again I gotta punch him and run, because if I don’t, he’ll do it to me.” He thinks he hears Mrs. Rothschild actually chuckle at those words.

Then she says, loud enough for him to hear easily, “Under different circumstances, I think Dr. Maturin might have enjoyed his company. I know they both share a love for natural philosophy.”

“If that’s what you call a bug fetish.”

At that remark, Mrs. Rothschild outright laughed, a sound so unexpected it struck Stephen. Somehow it prompted him to put his book down, silently stalk to the drawing room entrance, and peer outside. He had a greeting ready in case they had their heads turned towards it and saw him, but some instinct told him that would not be the case.

The two of them were at the far end of the hall, arm in arm, faces so close together that kissing would not have increased the intimacy of it very much. They did not even look very drunk, though they had perhaps consumed a little bit of wine, not enough to make their walk at all unsteady, but enough to make her face much brighter than he had previously seen it.

Perhaps, too, it was part of the reason she was looking at her companion the way she was. The main feature on her face was open affection, only a little bit of her amusement remaining. It made her to Stephen’s eyes look both younger and older.

He withdrew back into the drawing room, only just enough so there would be no chance of their seeing him. He at least knew they had not done so already when Mr. Stiles said, “You think the good doctor is still up? Guy strikes me as the type to stay up at night and lurk in the corners.”

Tonight, he had assessed the situation better than Mrs. Rothschild, who said, “After all the exertion he has had to engage in today, surely he must be asleep, as he said he would be, remember.”

She was no fool, however. The next thing she said was, “We need to keep an eye out, however. I am almost certain he is here to spy on us as much as on the French.”

“So they couldn’t leave us alone, could they?” sighed Mr. Stiles. “Never mind that it’s been made clear to me I’m to still work against Napoleon, whatever anybody else involved is doing, and meanwhile they’d be damn idiots if they took you away from here. I tell you, if any of those assholes from wherever they’re running it out of now come here to inquire about my loyalties..what’s he gonna do? He better not try to hurt either of us. It’ll be two against one then, and it’ll be all his fault.”

He spoke as if he had no doubt that she would protect him from her own colleagues. But Stephen thought that at least somewhat presumptive on his part when he heard her cautious response, “I do not think he will engage us in such a manner if we give him no good reason to. He is a very smart man.”

Her lover understood her thoughts as well. “So you might not?” he demanded, and there was a new, harder anger there, unlike anything there had been in his cross words to her earlier that day. “If he came out here right now and tried to kill me, you’d just stand here?”

“I would not let him kill you.” She spoke it swiftly and certainly; no doubt there.

“Well,” he replied, unimpressed, “nice to know you wouldn’t let him go *that* far.” His footsteps increased in volume, both because he was now passing the drawing room, and because he was in fact storming by it.

“Jack!” Mrs. Rothschild called after him. “Jack!” He gave no response before Stephen heard their footsteps reach the stairs, descend upward, and then fade from his hearing.

Stephen remained another hour in the drawing room, engaging in a little further reading, and listening for if either of them came back downstairs. When they did not, he eventually descended back down to the laboratory to sleep, and found himself hoping that his two hosts had at resolved their quarrel, at least for the night, before they had slept.

[deniscollins]

As Bolsonaro Keeps Amazon Vows, Brazil’s Indigenous Fear ‘Ethnocide’

Brazil’s 1988 Constitution confers expansive rights to Brazil’s Indigenous people, a form of reparations for centuries of brutal treatment. The Uru Eu Wau Wau territory, in the southern part of the Amazon rainforest, encompasses a 6,950 square mile area — a little smaller than the state of New Jersey — where the tribe has built a cluster of small villages and is now home to about 220 Uru Eu Wau Wau people, as well as a few smaller uncontacted tribes whose exact populations are unknown. Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro promised he would open up the Amazon to more commercial development, including mining and large-scale farming. If you were President Bolsonaro, would you lead the effort to open the Uru Eu Wau Wau’s territory to mining and large scale farming: (1) Yes, (2) No? Why? What are the ethics underlying your decision?

The billboard at the entrance of a tiny Indigenous village in the Amazon has become a relic in less than a decade, boasting of something no longer true.

“Here, there is investment by the federal government,” proclaims the sign, erected in 2012, which is now shrouded by fallen palm tree fronds.

In fact, this tiny hamlet in Rondônia state, called Alto Jamari, home to some 10 families of the Uru Eu Wau Wau tribe, is barely surviving, just like scores of other struggling villages in the region that for decades have served as havens for Indigenous culture and bulwarks against deforestation in Brazil.

Federal aid is drying up at the same time that more outsiders are trespassing on their lands, eager to illegally exploit the forest’s resources, and as the coronavirus poses a deadly threat, having already reached a few remote villages.

Local leaders and Indigenous advocates direct their blame for this deteriorating situation toward one person: President Jair Bolsonaro.

During his run for the presidency, Mr. Bolsonaro promised he would open up the Amazon to more commercial development, including mining and large-scale farming.

“Where there is Indigenous land,” he has said, “there is wealth underneath it.”

Since taking office a little more than a year ago, Mr. Bolsonaro has moved aggressively to further those development goals, putting in place policies that critics fear have set in motion a new era of ethnocide for Indigenous communities.

He has started dismantling a system of protection for Indigenous communities enshrined in Brazil’s Constitution, with his government last year slashing the funding of the National Indian Foundation, the federal agency responsible for upholding those Indigenous rights.

As president, he has vowed not to designate “one centimeter” more as protected Indigenous lands, arguing that living in isolation is an anachronism in the 21st century and an impediment to economic growth.

“The Indigenous person can’t remain in his land as if he were some prehistoric creature,” Mr. Bolsonaro said in February.

Also in February, Mr. Bolsonaro presented a bill to Congress that could effectively legalize the illegal mining ventures that have polluted rivers and torn down large swaths of the Amazon.

The proposed legislation, which Congress has shown no appetite to advance as Brazil battles the coronavirus, would also authorize oil and gas exploration and hydropower plants on Indigenous territories. Under the plan, native communities would be consulted about projects — but would not be given veto power.

Last year, Mr. Bolsonaro bragged that he had “put an end to” what he called “astronomical fines” against companies that violate environmental law in the Amazon, removing one of the few disincentives developers face.

Brazil’s president is keeping his promises about expanding development in the Amazon. And for many of the Indigenous people who live there, the Bolsonaro era is posing an existential threat.

Brazil’s 1988 Constitution confers expansive rights to Brazil’s Indigenous people, a form of reparations for centuries of brutal treatment.

While these rights have never been fully upheld, they are being eviscerated in the Bolsonaro era, according to Indigenous leaders and activists.

For communities with small populations, like the Uru Eu Wau Wau, the government’s stance could mean their total disappearance as distinct tribes.

The schoolhouse at the largest of the Uru Eu Wau Wau’s six villages — a modern facility surrounded by a cluster of modest huts — sits empty. Teachers stopped showing up last year because they weren’t being paid.

Visits from doctors and nurses have become rare, in large part because Cuban doctors who had been providing care in remote villages left abruptly shortly before Mr. Bolsonaro took office in January 2019 in response to threats from the incoming president.

Illegal incursions by loggers into the edges of the territory have become increasingly frequent, putting its residents on a war footing.

“They’re razing down our forest,” Juvitai Uru Eu Wau Wau, 19, said while swinging on a hammock as a toddler pushed a dusty tricycle around a cluster of small huts. As is common, Juvitai uses the tribe’s name as her family name.

Children in the village have picked up on the collective angst, Juvitai said, and constantly ask whether their days living in relative isolation are coming to an end.

“I tell them to be calm,” Juvitai said, sounding uncertain. “This is our land. We’re staying here.”

On a satellite image, the Uru Eu Wau Wau territory stands out as an emerald green island surrounded by parcels of razed forest, most of which are now cattle ranches.

In 1991, the federal government officially designated the Uru Eu Wau Wau territory. It encompasses a 6,950 square mile area — a little smaller than the state of New Jersey — where the tribe has built a cluster of small villages. This federal recognition is supposed to confer limited political autonomy, prohibiting outsiders from entering without explicit permission and barring large-scale commercial activity.

The territory, still technically owned by the federal government, is now home to about 220 Uru Eu Wau Wau people, as well as a few smaller uncontacted tribes whose exact populations are unknown.

The Uru Eu Wau Wau have endured illegal incursions from loggers for years. But in February of last year, it became clear the tribe was facing a far graver threat when some 200 men strode into their territory with the apparent intent to establish a permanent settlement.

After the Uru Eu Wau Wau protested and the incursion drew the attention of the Brazilian news media, the federal police did step in to expel the men. But such enforcement actions are rare, and it’s impossible for the authorities to effectively patrol such a vast region, which both the loggers and tribes know well.

Soon after the police left, someone opened fire on a government plaque at one of the main entrances to the territory that signals that the area is protected. It sent a chilling message to the Uru Eu Wau Wau.

“What we’re seeing is the result of a government that is in favor of deforestation in the Amazon,” said Bitate Uru Eu Wau Wau, a leader in the community. “It has emboldened invaders to come into Indigenous territories.”

Federal prosecutors in the state said these incursions are part of a wave of illegal squatters who raze protected land, harvest the wood and then carve out land parcels for which they create fake titles.

Loggers, miners, cattle ranchers and others have used this approach in the Amazon for many years, and it has often paid off because lawmakers have time and again created pathways for squatters to rightfully own land they took possession of unlawfully.

But while their tactics are not new, prosecutors say the squatters have become increasingly brazen since Mr. Bolsonaro’s election, abetted by his disdain for environmental fines and the government’s attitude toward development.

“The objective is to create facts on the ground,” said Daniel Azevedo, a federal prosecutor in Porto Velho, the Rondônia state capital, who focuses on environmental and Indigenous crimes.

Deforestation in Indigenous territories across Brazil has risen sharply in recent months. From August 2018 to July 2019, 1,634 square miles of forest cover was slashed, according to Brazil’s National Institute for Space Studies. That represents a 74 percent increase from the same period a year before.

The Uru Eu Wau Wau territory was among the 10 hardest hit by deforestation during that time.

Mr. Azevedo said law enforcement officials can build cases against particularly egregious drivers of deforestation. But he added the authorities are ill equipped to roll back the forces driving deforestation at a time when squatters feel backed by elected officials.

“They take comfort in the political reality, sensing that local politicians, senators, even the president supports their cause,” Mr. Azevedo said.

The Uru Eu Wau Wau is one of several Indigenous communities that have seen a sharp rise in land incursions and threats in the Bolsonaro era. Further north, the Yanomami and Munduruku tribes have been invaded by thousands of gold miners.

In 2019, at least seven Indigenous leaders were killed in conflicts over land.

At a meeting last year with the governors of Brazil’s nine Amazonian states, Mr. Bolsonaro made clear he saw Indigenous lands and their inhabitants as a drag on Brazil’s potential.

“Indigenous people don’t lobby, don’t speak our language, and yet today they manage to have 14 percent of our national territory,” he said, using a figure slightly larger than the government’s own statistics. “One of their intentions is to hold us back.”

Mr. Bolsonaro, who won the presidency with 55 percent of the vote, has many supporters who agree with his contention that Indigenous communities should not be in control of the 12.5 percent of the country’s landmass demarcated as Indigenous land.

Daniel da Cunha, 60, who lives just outside the Uru Eu Wau Wau territory, said those territories should be carved up so jobless people can put them to profitable use.

“They don’t work,” he said of Indigenous people. “They don’t bring in money for Brazil, only burdens.”

Some lawmakers argue that Mr. Bolsonaro is right to want to upend Brazil’s Indigenous policy, but favor a more moderate approach.

Arthur Oliveira Maia, a center-right congressman from the state of Bahia, said that under the current legal framework, no one, including the Indigenous tribes themselves, can profit from the reserved territories.

“Commercial endeavors in Indigenous territories could be done gradually, setting aside 10 or 15 percent of the land,” he said.

He added that he favored starting out with agriculture, which tends to have a lower environmental impact, rather than mining.

“Today Indigenous people are struggling,” he said. “The emancipation of these people is only possible through economic means.”

Mr. Bolsonaro has long spoken derisively about Indigenous people. In 1998, when he was a fringe far-right lawmaker, Mr. Bolsonaro said it was a “shame that the Brazilian cavalry hadn’t been as efficient as the American one, which exterminated the Indians.”

What Mr. Bolsonaro did not acknowledge is that Brazil’s Indigenous people were almost wiped out after Europeans arrived in the early 16th century.

The Indigenous population in modern day Brazil plunged from estimates of between three million and as many as 11 million people in the 1500s to 70,000 by the 1950s as entire tribes were killed off, while huge numbers were enslaved.

After Brazil’s generals seized power in the 1960s, the repressive military government — which Mr. Bolsonaro has long lionized — treated Indigenous people living in the Amazon as obstacles to economic growth.

The country’s 1988 Constitution tried to redress some of these wrongs.

It ended the military-era policy that had encouraged the assimilation of Indigenous people and recognized their “customs, languages, beliefs and traditions.”

The Constitution also established a process of land demarcation that over the years created the vast patchwork of 567 protected Indigenous territories. In 2010, when Brazil conducted its last census, about 517,000 of the country’s 897,000 Indigenous people lived in those lands.

On his first day in office, Mr. Bolsonaro transferred the land demarcation process from the National Indian Foundation, known as FUNAI, to the Ministry of Agriculture, which is heavily influenced by the agribusiness lobby. The Supreme Court blocked the move, finding it unconstitutional, but all pending demarcation cases remain frozen.

In addition to the challenge on transferring FUNAI, Mr. Bolsonaro has encountered other setbacks or delays. Leaders in Congress have signaled they are not in a hurry to move forward on his bill to authorize energy projects in Indigenous lands.

But the power of the presidency still gives him plenty of opportunity to further his vision.

The government recently appointed a former Christian missionary, Ricardo Lopes Dias, to head the FUNAI division in charge of protecting uncontacted tribes. While Mr. Dias has pledged not to use his post to proselytize, his appointment incited fears the government will allow missionaries to make contact with isolated communities, which are vulnerable to dying en mass from common diseases during such encounters.

A representative of FUNAI said the agency is investing in entrepreneurship and sustainability programs like artisanal fishing and small-scale honey-making ventures that are meant to encourage the autonomy of Indigenous communities.

For years before Mr. Bolsonaro became president, FUNAI had already been contending with personnel shortages and lean budgets, which forced the agency to abandon several outposts in remote areas and cut the frequency of visits to villages.

While the agency’s authorized budget had remained relatively steady in recent years, the Bolsonaro administration made a sharp cut to programmatic spending for 2020, earmarking $9 million for programs to uphold Indigenous rights, about 40 percent less than the year before.

The association that represents career employees at the agency said in a statement the reduction means FUNAI has an increasingly thin presence on the ground, leaving those communities besieged by land grabbers at greater risk.

“This is the first time in which government planning,” the employee association said, “does not contemplate the Indigenous rights guaranteed by the Constitution.”

Whenever the Uru Eu Wau Wau learn of new incursions into their territory, they set out on foot to survey the damage and burn settler encampments. As a group prepared at dawn for one recent expedition, warriors in the tribe slathered poison on the tips of their arrows.

Ivaneide Bandeira Cardozo, an activist who often accompanies the Uru Eu Wau Wau, looked ashen, fearing what a confrontation with loggers could lead to.

“You need to promise me that if you run into them you won’t kill,” she pleaded.

“If we don’t kill, it will get worse day by day,” one of the men responded.

During an arduous six-hour hike through dense forest, the Uru Eu Wau Wau waded through water and clouds of buzzing insects to reach a large stretch of land that had recently been reduced to ashes.

The Uru Eu Wau Wau could do little more than take photos of the damage and then set fire to the small encampment.

When asked about what the Bolsonaro administration’s policies may do to communities like these, Ms. Cardozo, who has supported the tribe for decades, looked dejected.

“Their objective is to force them from their lands and turn them into ordinary citizens in the periphery of cities, into beggars,” she said. “To me that amounts to a policy of genocide and ethnocide.”

One of the oldest members of the tribe, Borea Uru Eu Wau Wau, has scars on her back from bullet wounds she suffered during an ambush by rubber trappers in the 1980s. A sister, aunt and grandmother were killed then, she recalled.

Since the new wave of incursions began, Borea has experienced flashbacks, which have left her with a fatalistic view about the future.

“It takes too long to wait for justice, for which we’ve waited and waited,” she said, speaking barely above a whisper. “It’s easier to kill.”

[stop-brunotime]

CW: I'm ranting about personal stuff, using bad language, feeling shit about myself and being a bad example, complaining about my emotionally abusive mother, etc. Proceed with caution. This is further to my post on Thursday. Thank you to everyone who reached out. It meant the world, and I'll reply individually when I'm done with this post. I'm going to list the questions that have been bugging me to the point of suicidal ideation, and if you know the answers, please help a sibling out!

Christmas

Am I the only one bothered by Christmas trees? Like, everyone knows Jesus was probably born in August/September, because that's when Judaism's 'go visit the family' holidays are and there's no way shepherds would've been hanging out in the pastures in midwinter. Christmas trees are a blind appropriation of European Paganism's customs (and, while we're at it, holiday, since it's not even Jesus's real birthday). We're all claiming to celebrate Jesus, when in reality we're just marking our homes as places the tree spirits can overwinter. How can we claim to live lives of peace and love and do ignorant, appropriative shit like that?

Santa. FFS, this one grates my carrot to the quick. Named for St Nicholas (who was an African bishop and very definitely Black, despite what the white supremacists will tell you on Twitter), Santa seems to be a combination of Scandinavian Pagan myths. Either he's a Christian appropriation of Odinn, who gave kids gifts at midwinter, or he's an erasure of Sami (native Scandinavians, traditionally marginalised) shamans (who were typically women) who apparently gave the grown-ups entheogenic mushrooms. So, we're erasing POC and Native women and getting toxic about it on socials. Nice. I totally want gifts from that guy! (I'm aware that in Spain and Germany [and probably other countries too] it's the Baby Jesus who brings the gifts. I'm not resident in one of those countries, so have to deal with all the Santa bullshit) Again, we claim to be all about the peace and love how?!

Bringing me to Christians. Now, I identify as one, so am spraying friendly fire here. Why are my choices of places to worship either the kind who preach heterosexism from the pulpit, regularly using 'the homosexuals' as our go-to example of unrepentant sinners bound for eternity in Hell, or the kind who just don't mention it, which feels like ominous silence? The church who don't actively hate on queers have asked me to play in their music group. I gave guy some bullshit reason about being too busy to do something I would actually like to do as a person of faith, because I was scared that, if I started doing it and they found out I occasionally fall for women and NBs/GNCs, they'd throw me out and publicly shame me and maybe sell me out to the cops (who are wildly heterosexist, backed up by the law, and allegedly not above a bit of corrective gang rape of queer prisoners).

And onto Trump. The man reminds me of my mother. And that makes me a terrible human, because he does so many worse things than triggering memories of her being consistently passive-aggressive and theologically inaccurate about "Christian values". He makes such rapey comments all the fucking time, and just dismisses anyone who tries to call him on it. He is the embodiment of everything that's wrong with the world, and yet I meet so many people who love him. We live in fucking Africa...what exactly are we doing supporting the guy who's defunding all the USAID healthcare programs that keep us in contraceptives? Like, sure, I've never had an abortion, and, barring medical necessity or a pregnancy from being raped again, am probably going to keep any pregnancy I achieve before menopause (which is only ten years away, and I don't exactly have the most active sex life from which to achieve a pregnancy)...but I've been the emergency contact on enough hospital admission forms to know that it's a necessary medical procedure and people need access to quick, cheap, and as-painless-as-possible abortions. We got that from USAID. Now Trump has fucked that up and we need to go private, which is a D&C under full anaesthesia, with associated risks. Sure, Trump blustered a bit about Mugabe, but didn't do anything real in the eleven months between him taking office and us having our coup-that's-not-a-coup. Tweeting doesn't count. How exactly is that asshole going to be 'the next Mordecai of Israel' and 'the one to rid the world of dictatorship'?

Speaking of pathological Machiavellian narcissists, does anyone have resources for recovering from a parent who used you to meet her needs from when you were really small? She never raped me or anything, but the long-term emotional neglect, belittling, passive-aggression, criticism, gaslighting, parental alienation (yes, for almost twenty years she had me convinced that my dad, whom I love and who I'm most like, was the angry abuser in their relationship and she was the victim) have taken their toll. My therapist says I need to adjust my expectations of her and my problems will go away. I see her point, but my mother is still mean as fuck. For example, she sent me a room diffuser that smelled like it came from a pound shop for Christmas. (It was called 'african spice'. It smelled of cinnamon. There are no African spices. Cinnamon is from Asia. She's heard me rant several times about people mis-labelling plant origins, so it's not like she doesn't know how much it bugs me.) This is after a quarter century of me saying variations on, 'Books or nothing, but please no cash or girly shit,' every Christmas and birthday. This is after coming out to her as genderqueer. She said she immediately thought of me when she saw it. Surely there's a more direct way to tell me that I or my house smell/s bad? Perhaps a way that doesn't subtly signal that she still frames me as the gender-perfect imaginary daughter she has in her head? She went to the effort of having it brought to Zimbabwe in a suitcase (what comes in suitcases isn't charged import tax). She could have spent that fiver on a second-hand book from Amazon, sent it out in a way that bypassed ZIMRA's human rights violation of a book tax, and given me the gift of freedom of information. But she chose to force her gender ideals on me in a way that says, yet again, that I need to be just a little bit better to be worthy of her love

I'm legit concerned that she's made me a horrible person. She gave me so many of her issues that I'm pretty sure everyone feels about me the way they do about her. I'm sure everyone looks at me and sees the lack of tangible results that come from being terrified of being publicly shamed as crazy and weird. I'm horribly awkward and say the wrong thing often. I've had dates end because I got awkward and up in my head and told him that wood cockroaches eat their parents' shit to replenish their gut flora after molting. I take days, sometimes months, to reply to messages. I hold opinions that are shared by a tiny minority of scientists and theologians, and everyone disagrees. And my writing output bears this out. The only time people say nice stuff about my writing is when I've written porn under a fake name that doesn't really have socials. The rest of the time, it's people calling me out or trolling me. Am I wrong? Is the internet just a toxic shit hole? Is everyone talking smack about me in DM, and I have no idea how many people are laughing at me? Should I just delete all my accounts, move to the Andes, change my name, and raise llamas for yarn and bees for mead?

What even is the right thing to do? I was raised with so much certainty, and have since found out things like the universe wasn't made in six days five thousand years ago, and nobody really knows where Mount Sinai is. It doesn't feel right to just pick the most convenient set of rules. I should be able to tell what the right choice is. Who died and bequeathed me the right to decide right from wrong? How am I supposed to help others when I don't even know the answers myself (and neither do any of the scholars, who are simply putting forward a best guess model) and will probably be wrestling with existential questions on my death bed? Put your own mask on first, sure, but how do I fit all these masks on one face?

[fluentlanguage]

5 Ways to Inspire Your Partner to Learn Your Language (Without Ruining The Relationship)

It’s easy to fall in love, even without words. But sadly, learning a language doesn’t become easier even if you’re in love. Just like good relationships, learning a language is a long-term game. It takes compromise, commitment, and a bit of hard work.

The easiest way to communicate as a couple is to stay in the language you were using when you met. Most couples settle on a common “official language”. For me and my partner, it’s English. English is my everyday language, and I don’t have the habit of switching into German with my partner. As for him, he didn’t come out of school with remarkable knowledge or confidence when it comes to foreign languages.

Most of the time, our life together works just fine. But I do wonder:

“Do we have to move to Germany before my husband has the opportunity to become a German speaker?”

“How can I walk the line between forcing him to pick up my language, and encouraging him to discover the culture of my home country?”

“How can I help him learn German without becoming his teacher?”

We are facing that classic native English dilemma: If everyone else speaks English already, where’s the urgency and pressure to learn another language?

Love is a Deep Motivator

No matter where your partner is from, you’re likely to spend a lifetime trying to figure out what exactly goes on in their head. As Carol Madfouh puts it in this lovely article on language learning for love:

“For us and any other couple from a mixed marriage you are having to work that wee bit harder the whole time to understand the mentality (…) I’m never quite certain whether I am pissed off with him because he’s Tunisian, because he’s French, because he’s a man… or whether just because he’s old!”

If you are the partner who is learning a new language for love, I want to thank you and congratulate you. I know it’s not easy, but you’re doing something amazing. Your desire for a deeper connection has a lot of value. It serves as your Vision Goal, the consistent motivation that keeps you committed to the problem.

Tips for Sharing Your Language With Your Partner

If you are the partner who wishes you could share more of your own language and culture in your relationship, I’m with you. It can be tough to walk the line between sharing your language and nagging someone to learn it.

Here are the things you can try for keeping your sweetheart motivated without putting too much pressure on them.

1) Talk to Third Parties

Every language learner knows that it feels bad to understand nothing, especially when you care about the person who is speaking to you. Introducing your native language into the household becomes a lot easier when there’s a third party around. Adding bilingualism to the home is common when you have a child (try Bilingual Avenue for more tips). But even if you don’t have kids, it helps to have your partner hear simple dialogues in another language.

If you are an expat yourself, your sweetheart likely won’t hear a lot of your native language outside the home. But what about your own circle of friends? Try and see if you can invite a fellow native speaker around the home, giving you more occasion to throw in a few words of vocabulary now and then.

At the Polyglot Gathering in Bratislava, one fellow expat wife told me she switched to talking to her pet in another language. What a great idea! This way you can keep your native language active in the home without putting the pressure on way high.

2) Let Them Know What To Expect

One of the trickiest parts of switching into your native language with your partner is that you can never be sure what mood they are in. They may respond with curiosity and enthusiasm one day, only to roll their eyes and ask to be left alone the next. So it’s helpful to make your non-English moments a little more predictable.

Try setting up an English-free zone in your house, where your partner knows they will be able to practice. I can’t decide if I would suggest the bedroom for this, or tell you to avoid that at all costs..

Have a regular date night with your native language where you spend time experiencing something new like a restaurant, dance lesson, or language meet up

Set language times or days, so you know that both of you have agreed to switch languages once a week

3) Treat Language as an In-Joke

In an animated discussion on language learning, Idahosa Ness from the Mimic Method shared that a past girlfriend and he would speak her native language to each other as a sign of closeness. Learning the language came more easily to him as he felt he was in on a private joke with his sweetheart.

Just like nicknames, sharing a second language can make any couple feel more deeply connected. If you want to build your own private language together, try starting with a few loving phrases, or learning the words related to something you love to do together.

4) Share Your Background Without The Language Barrier

If your partner lacks confidence when it comes to learning your native language, you can still offer many fun ways of engaging with your background. Bring in foods or music from home, or discuss the politics of your home country. As long as the topic is interesting to your partner, it will serve as an inspiration for both of you to connect to each other’s cultures.

Sharing traditions of your home country is what makes you special as a couple. It can also create memories that last for life. At my wedding in Germany, my husband asked for us to act out the German tradition of sawing a log together as the couple. My parents happily obliged…with a pretty blunt saw! The experience of my neighbour running in to “rescue the couple” with his chainsaw won’t be forgotten any time soon.

5) Learn a third language together

The biggest problem with teaching your native language to your sweetheart is that it can create a power imbalance. You don’t want them to feel like the stupid one, right? Some couples have reported that learning a third language together became a great leveller and hobby. Go for something that you both consider relatively neutral and easy, such as Esperanto. This way, it’s their chance to flex those study muscles without feeling any pressure.

Respect Your Partner’s Learning Style

Allow your partner to determine the pace and learning style that they prefer. Even if you are a polyglot who swears by using Anki cards, their own preference might be for starting out in an adult class at the local college. Keep them accountable to their own goals, but never to demand unreasonable efforts. It may help to discuss their language learning goals together and to keep easy accountability through something like the Language Habit Toolkit. Like a good tutor, your job is to inspire motivation and excitement and to refrain from judgement.

Have you ever been in a relationship with someone from a different country? How did you go about language learning? Tell me more in the comments below. I’m excited to hear those stories.

[turklingua]

Turkish Translation and Becoming a Turkish Translator http://bit.ly/2Se1ryT

Translating is the situation of “articulating” the entire emotional and intellectual activities in the chaotic soul structure of human being. In the heart of this complexity or chaos, translator is the person who analyzes all these perception processes with the emotional-intellectual power of the author and his or her language of expression, and fulfills “articulating” in his own language. There are three essential main essential components in the translation action: Our first essential is knowledge accumulation; we mean that the translator is culturally equipped . Our second essential is the ability of emotion-dream transfer; we can call it creative ability. Our the third and last essential is that the source and target language knowledge is at the certain level of translating. It is faced with human nature and human beings who acts different from what they say and do, and who can be defined in thousands of characters. Humans have a curiosity and passion to deal with invisible and unknown areas. When we begin to write this curiosity and passion out, the thing what we call literature arises. The author who has the ability of making invisible ones visible, the unknown ones known, only needs expert translators to spread out his discoveries to the world.

The way to be an expert translator is to built multiple relationships with life and to articulate the other lives far away or the lives right besides us, with the emotional and intellectual accumulation that is gained from the totality of these multiple relationships which is not possible to be known without translating action. Translation action is not a simple, mechanical or ordinary interposition, but requires to constitute a common language with the author and the editor. Creating a common language is one of the hardest act and the translator does one of those hard work. Translator is the person who shows the success of integrating with the heart and brain of the author. In other words, he is the soul mate of the author not someone else based upon the work that he translates. Interpreting, except your native language, is the act of transferring, analyzing and perception of any knowledge at any language what it means in your native language. It is necessary to have an objective and moral stance when carrying out this action. You can not say a word that is not said in the original text; you can not construe a sentence or word you do not know! There is the importance of translating profession: we need to learn what we do not know and communication for the flow of life, that information in foreign languages should be translated into our native language to get the information, assimilate and reproduce.

It is impossible to communicate with other countries and lives without translation, the power and the importance of the translation profession emerges here. There are dozens of occupational areas within the definition of translator. For example, people who will translate literary and commercial areas must have different qualities. When we think that there are different fields within these two fields, I can say that the qualifications of the translator should be determined according to the area selection. However, it is essential to have the ability of writing, analytical thinking, creativity, and language skills both the native and foreign language. The perception of interpreting in Turkey is based on the perception of “a job that anyone who knows a foreign language can do”. This is extremely wrong generalization! We have to break this perception and generalization; because knowing foreign languages is just one of the most important elements of translation. If I express within the context of literary translation, interpreting is not a job that can be done without the intellectual accumulation and authorship ability. The translator has a changing relationship according to each book, but if there are topic concerning sentimentality and justice in it, you will unintentionally take a side but you will have to conceal…

The translation should remain as good as the original text. The translator does not have a mission of making the original text better! There are physical, mental effort and energy of the editor, translator, proofreader and other people in any book that has been translated. The quality of the translation excels in when these energies are in harmony with each other. To be a translator in Turkey means to work under aggravated circumstances with low wages, without having any social security. We have no choice other than to be organized to stop this. If you are not economically dependent on to translate; if you say I can not stand the pressure of the boss or manager; translating for sure seems to be attractive in this sense, but words and sentences that we can not figure out and meet a lot of difficulties when deciphering, takes the place of pressure of the boss or manager… Setting many experienced difficulties aside I would say: you look at yourself with the eye of a creator when your translation gets credit and becomes a book that takes its place in bookcase or shelves.

You are that creator! Could it be a greater happiness than that? You contribute to yourself and others and to life by translating every work you do. There is no training required to become a translator; however I recommend you to place training in somewhere of your life to become a good translator. A translator who does not have translation training can do successful translations; however these translations are usually coincidence. An educated translator can explain what, how and why he translated. Expert knowledge is important. Do not expect the time you will translate to have knowledge about the topic you will be translating. Research, learn, get ready for the translation as you are studying lesson. You should also improve yourself out of school. Make the translation a part of your life. Try to translate what you listen, watch, read in your daily life. Repeat the exercises every day in this way. Pay attention to develop your general culture, accumulation of your popular culture. Follow the news, current events. Be informed of economics, literature, politics, etc. Prepare a CV to yourself, accumulate things to add to your CV until you graduate. Participate to seminars, conferences, volunteer projects, attend courses. Try to build connections with benificial people. Do not underestimate the written translation.

Making a written translation is also a part of providing sufficient accumulation for interpreting. Your character may be suitable to verbal translation; however instead of running away from the translation by pleading, go over your problems. Develop yourself regarding the issues such as enduring and continuous focusing, long working time, meeting the deadlines. We often don’t choose to work as a full-time or freelance translator. Working freelance chooses us. If it chooses you, get your home environment well organized. A large table, a fridge full of tertiary processed meals and a high speed computer can be a good idea for a proper working environment. When we enter the sector, usually the things may not go as planned. You are interested in art; but you can face always with an automotive translation. Suddenly, you can find yourself as a specialized translator in the automotive sector. Interest, curiosity and enthusiasm are good. But do not worry if you can not get jobs in the areas you want, learn to love the fields where you work. Go ahead with preliminary preparation whatever you will interpret; never interpret by yourself, especially when you are new graduate. Do not go alone for more than one or two hours interpretations after you gain a certain experience. There can be anything during interpreting, you may face with unexpected problems. Make confidentiality and impartiality your first principle. Do not share the contents of any meetings with third parties. Never do a biased translation. The conference interpreter is the headliner of the translation cabin.

When you get on the stage, do not let anyone to interfere which song you will sing. Translation is a creation. It is a product that you entirely produce; so all rights are yours. If your voice is recorded, demand copyright for your product. Translator interprets in oral translation jobs. Do not try to solve technical problems. Do not fall back upon the organization. We live in the global world. Speakers from all over the world can speak English at international meetings. Be prepared to hear different accents. Include speakers with different accents among your oral translation exercises. Interpreting is an enjoyable activity; however the market we try to survive, requires you to have nerves of steel. Be gentle, smile and learn to look in the bright side of everything. He who gets up in anger, sits down with a loss. Do not allow to suffer from the competitive feelings and ambition. Your colleagues may be your friends or turn into your competitors according to your attitude. Try to built good relationships with everyone. Interpreting is already difficult; doing this without breaking any heart and having fun, is completely in your hands. You should continue to built up your language training that you get at school with your personal studies. Area selection is difficult, on the way of this selection do not be hurry to decide, it will settle in time. The most important point is to know your own language first, please often read books. Be reminded that it is not expected to make healthy translations from someone, who has no command of his native language. Appearance and attitude are quite important in the field of interpreting. People are ready to judge you, even with your appearance, the way of sitting. When you get in a platform, if you show a profile that is lack of confidence, people try to abuse you and pile extra work to you in every sense. So take a tough stance and try to recover your mistakes instantly, and the most important thing is to trust yourself and be proud of your work.

The post Turkish Translation and Becoming a Turkish Translator appeared first on Turkish Translation Service Company for Businesses & Individuals, Professional, Fast and Easy.

[crisskrausoh]

Shedding light on my own Imaginary

“What is Aboriginality? Is it being tribal? Who is an Aboriginal? Is he or she someone who feels that other Aboriginals are somehow dirty, lazy, drunken, bludgers? Is an Aboriginal anyone who has some degree of blood in his or her veins and who has been demonstrably disadvantaged by that? Or is an Aboriginal someone who has had the reserve experience? Is Aboriginality institutionalised gutlessness, an acceptance of the label ‘the most powerless people on earth’?’ Or is Aboriginality when all the definitions have been exhausted a yearning for a different way of being, a wholeness that was presumed to have existed before 1776?

Irene Watson (Jordan, 1988: 114)

“As I am an Aborigine, I inhabit an Aboriginal body, and not a combination of features which may or may not cancel each other. Whatever language I speak, I speak an Aboriginal language, because a lot of Aboriginal people speak like me. How I speak, act and how I look are outcomes of a colonial history, and not a particular combination of traits from either side of the frontier”

Ian Anderson (2003: 51)

“The whole policy of Black Power in Australia is a policy of self-assertion, of self-identity”

Paul Coe (Stokes, 1997: 165)

“They came, They saw, They named, They claimed”

Linda Tuhiwai-Smith (Anderson, 2003: 22)

‘Orientalism’ or its ‘Australian’ equivalent, ‘Aboriginalism’, denies recognition of the ‘Aboriginal-as-subject’. The naming and labeling of the landscape, events and people by “explorers” is a case in point. The process is intimate in that the coloniser “produces the colonised as a fixed reality which is at once an ‘other’ and yet entirely knowable and visible” (Bhabha, 1983: 23) at the same time as “distancing himself…by not learning to know it on its own terms” (Sider, 1987: 12). That is, Indigenous-settler relations are marked by a “refusal to come close to or become familiar with the reality of indigenous experience” (Cowlishaw, 1998: 155). Binary categories are naturalised within colonial discourses to locate ‘non-indigenous’ at the opposite pole to ‘indigenous’. Paradoxically, whilst critiquing these binaries, I employ them throughout this essay, demonstrating the tensions embedded in language itself. Constructions of the “primitive”, “savage” or “spiritual other” is a reflection of settlers’ fears, aversions and desires, rather than Indigenous peoples realities. Thus I believe that stereotypic images of the ‘Other’ are self-serving myths used to legitimate frontier violence, dispossession, denial of citizenship rights, and so on. Langton (2009) suggests,

“The central problem is the failure of non-Aboriginals to comprehend us Aboriginal people, or to find the grounds for an understanding. Each policy – protection, assimilation, integration, self-management, self-determination and even, perhaps, reconciliation – can be seen as ways of avoiding understanding”.

Settler and Indigenous identities are mutually shaped in intimate engagement, attraction and opposition. Identities are (re)produced in multiple locations: criminal justice, welfare, the national politics of Mabo and land claims, the domains of tourism and art galleries, government bureaucracies, media and academia (Cowlishaw, 1997: 3). In this essay, I shall examine the contested nature of Aboriginalities amongst Aborigines; the way constructions based on descent or ‘blood’, cultural continuity and purification operate within Native Title; the dominant settler responses of denial and redemption and the way in which nationhood is reproduced through the discourse of “liberal multiculturalism” or in other words the re-appropriation of Indigenous-as-object through nationalist narratives. Finally, I shall explore the possibilities for transformation by exploiting the ambivalences within colonial discourses. Indigenous peoples have responded in multiple and creative ways to invasion and colonisation. Through a mixture of collusion and resistance, Indigenous peoples have historically challenged, and continue to disrupt colonial discourses.

Some worldviews assert that knowledge or ‘truth’ is not natural, timeless or universal, but produced, contingent, situated and particular: “not only is discourse always implicated in power, discourse is one of the “systems” through which power circulates” (Tuhiwai-Smith, 1999: 169). ‘Orientalism’ is synonymous to what Cowlishaw (1988: 87) terms ‘Aboriginalism’, where indigenous peoples are made in to ‘objects’ of knowledge, which gives material force to settlers’ representations. Michael Foucault refers to this phenomenon as “regimes of truth” (Tuhiwai-Smith, 1999: 166). Far from being passive recipients, Indigenous peoples actively shape, through both collusion and resistance, such “regimes of truth”. This material force has most obviously manifested as frontier violence and massacres, the forced removal of children from their families and entire peoples from their ancestral lands through reserves, missions and cattle stations, and the policies of “Protection”, “Segregation” and “Assimilation” (Dodson, 2003: 30). Paradoxically, these conditions “both give a people birth and simultaneously seek to take their lives” (Sider, 1987: 3). Settler identities and Indigenous peoples’ identities are co-constructed. Morris (1992: 80) argues that during the 19th century, images of Aboriginal people as wantonly violent and treacherous were used to create an atmosphere of ambivalence and uncertainty that rationalised settler violence, such as the ‘bushwack’ (killing sprees), satisfying the desire to eliminate the ‘Other’ and “restore a singular, straightforward reality”. Veracini (2008: 366) suggests that settlers constructed Indigenous peoples’ nomadism as “unsettled” and as an “intrusion” upon what became their own “indigenous” status. In policy discourse, Indigenous peoples remain a “problem” to be “solved” enabling an artificial disentanglement of settler-complicity in the trauma and injustices Indigenous peoples have suffered and continue to experience (Beckett, 1988: 2; Dodson, 2003: 27). European discourses constructed Indigenous peoples as indices to affirm settlers’ advanced condition along the evolutionists “Great Chain of Beings”, as abject referents to affirm settler superiority and as romanticised ‘other’ (Buchan, 2005: 47, Anderson, 2003; Dodson, 2003; Moreton-Robinson, 2003). Definitions of Aboriginality abound and whilst an Indigenous person is now officially classified by the government as self- and community-identified, non-Indigenous people and institutions continue to make “representational and aesthetic statements”, which Langton (2009) argues denies the “Aboriginal-as-subject”.

Aboriginality, in the sense it is known today, did not exist prior to British invasion (Maddison, 2009: 103). Indigenous peoples defined themselves according to language group and ‘clan’ or attachment to Country and Ancestor Beings who created the landscape, languages and Laws of existence (Graham, 1999; Rose, 2000). Social organisation such as ‘moiety’, ‘semi-moiety’ and skin further defined the ‘self’. Gender, sexuality and ability added to this diversity. Many Aboriginal people continue to identify in these ways. There is no single accepted definition of Indigeneity among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Indigeneity is “not a fixed thing, it is created from our histories…from the intersubjectivity of black and white in a dialogue” (Langton, 2009). Hollingsworth (1992: 140) identifies three broad discourses on Aboriginality: biological descent (‘blood’), cultural persistence and political resistance. Defining Aboriginality is a “source of political struggle both within Aboriginal communities and between them and the Australian state” (Stokes, 1997: 169). “Protection” policies operated upon racially prejudiced and essentialised beliefs of ‘degrees of blood’ as part of a sustained effort to assimilate the Aboriginal ‘population’ (Dodson, 2003: 35). Biological determinism persists as a tool of exclusion, for example in 1998 Returned Services League (RSL) President Brigadier Garland called for ‘genetic proof’ of a persons’ Aboriginality to determine membership (Hollingsworth, 1992: 142). Aboriginal people also employ notions of ‘blood’ as determining Aboriginality, such as the label “yellafella” implies, and in determining access to benefits or royalties (ibid). Huggins (2003: 63) argues that Aboriginality is more than genetic inheritance, a discourse she attributes to anthropology, but is contingent upon social practice and an embeddedness within kinship. Hollingsworth (1992: 145) argues that any claim to a set of universal traits that define Aboriginality is ultimately exclusive. However, Moreton-Robinson (2003: 32) argues that for Indigenous peoples, land is the essence of belonging and that the view of ‘self’ as not unitary nor fixed is situated in a ‘western’ epistemology that opposes (and yet employs) essentialism. Both Indigenous peoples and non-Indigenous people ‘essentialise’ Aboriginality and Aboriginal culture, however their motivations and consequences are quite different. Most non-Aboriginal people continue to assess Aboriginality based on skin colour and the practice of a ‘traditional’ lifestyle (Perkins, 2003: 100) which fails to recognise the heterogeneity and dynamism of Indigenous being.

Native title and ‘land rights’ regimes re-entrench traditionalised stereotypes based on cultural continuity or fixity and a ‘primitive-modern’ binary, creating new barriers to the recognition of identities. ‘Real’ Aboriginality is recognised as what settlers are not, and thus refuses to acknowledge the realities of colonial domination, interculturalism and historical change (Cowlishaw, 1997: 6; Maddison, 2009: 106). Dispossession was made possible by settlers’ engagement in the “linguistic and conceptual representations” that “affirmed settler experiences and interests” (Buchan, 2005: 3). Aboriginal peoples were seen as lacking governance or “polity”, “social organisation”, “land ownership” or “property” (ibid). Whilst overturning “terra nullius”, the Mabo High Court decision suppressed questions regarding the legal validity and legitimacy of Australia’s claim to sovereignty (Foley, 2007: 133). The legislation effectively re-dispossesses Indigenous peoples who do not fit settlers’ notions of Aboriginality, including urban, rural and various remote communities. As Hollingsworth (1992: 143) notes, “for certain Aboriginal communities who display or can mobilise the officially-sanctioned trappings of authenticity, their claim as bearers of the ‘worlds oldest living culture’ is relatively straightforward”. However, even those who manage to achieve claimant status are ‘caught’ by the “prison knowledge” of settler sensibilities (Sackett, 1991: 241; Dodson, 2003: 27). Land claims inspire in subaltern subjects not a desire to identify with their colonisers (as Franz Fanon suggests), but with the judges’ imagined model of Aboriginality, “a form of pure cultural difference untouched by and not oriented to state colonial history” (Povinelli, 2002: 162; Maddison, 2009: 105). At the same time they must “ghost this being for the nation so as to not have their desires for some economic certainty in their lives appear opportunistic” (Povinelli, 2002: 8). As Linda Tuhiwai-Smith (1999: 106) observes, “At the heart of such a view of authenticity is a belief that indigenous cultures cannot change, cannot recreate themselves and still claim to be indigenous. Nor can they be complicated, internally diverse or contradictory. Only the West has that privilege”. The Yorta Yorta people were the first group subject to this dehistoricised ‘recognition’ of their status as Traditional Owners, which denied the “complex intercultural realities” at the very moment indigenous-settler identities are entangled and co-constructed. Aboriginal people should not be limited by the past, nor denied the ability to reclaim it. As Dodson (2003: 40) eloquently puts it, “the past and the present and the future do not fall into distinct linear categories. The past cannot be limiting because we are always transforming it. In all expressions of our Aboriginality, we repossess our past, and ourselves”.

Settlers continue to produce and inherit images of Aboriginality that accord with biological determinism and cultural continuity. Threatening or non-threatening images are deployed to accommodate denialist and redemptive strategies respectively, which then reify new national identities. However it would be simplistic to suggest that only denialist strategies treat Aboriginal peoples as a threat. Birch (2003: 148) illustrates how a rural town council’s proposed ‘name restoration’ of tourist landmarks elicited hostile responses from locals who sought to protect the “memory”, “honour” and “sacrifice” of “pioneering forefathers”. Some local whites dismissed the Aboriginal community as a “cultureless remnant” (ibid). John Howard’ s use of “black armband” history and refusal to offer an apology is emblematic of politically conservative views still salient (Chandra-Shekeran, 1998: 131). However, the incorporative approach to settler-indigenous relations is equally as problematic. In Mabo the High Court used the language of shame, regret, embeddedness and implication in tandem with the “good that the common law and liberal democratic state was [and] sought to be” (Povinelli, 1998b: 160). Public commentators referred to a “redeemed social body, to an equitable society, and to a tolerant nonracist white subject” (ibid, 163). ‘Cultural appropriation’, the incorporation of metonyms (such as boomerang, didgeridu, Uluru or ‘deep history’) within nationalist narratives, sustains “an imagined community in Australia that now pride[s] itself on being ‘multicultural’ and ‘tolerant’” (Langton, 2003: 82; Birch, 2003: 151; Anderson, 2003: 46). Moreton-Robinson argues this is a strategy to “achieve the unattainable imperative of becoming Indigenous in order to erase unbelonging” (2003: 30). As Zizek (1997: 44) argues, “Multiculturalism is a disavowed, inverted, self-referential form of racism…it ‘respects’ the Other’s identity, conceiving the Other as a self-enclosed ‘authentic’ community towards which he, the multiculturalist, maintains a distance rendered possible by his privileged universal position…respect for the Other’s specificity is the very form of asserting one’s own superiority”. Liberal-thinkers position themselves as anti-racist without problemitising the institutions and processes that give rise to racialised representations and marginalisation (Cowlishaw, 1997: 3). This redemptive strategy creates the ‘Other’ whilst Indigenous peoples are silenced as their imagined world is being appropriated and their realities are ignored.

“The ‘authority’ of colonial discourse depends crucially on its location in narcissism and the Imaginary” (Bhabha, 1983: 32). Social Darwinism attributes meaning to human progress and ontology according to a linear temporality – “primitive” exists in contradistinction to “modernity”. Romanticised images of indigenous peoples have long been a way of affirming European identities and facilitating their own interests. The “primitive other” is something to disdain and/or desire; a phobia and/or fetish (ibid: 25). The ‘primitive-modern’ binary is invoked as a medium through which “political critiques of culture and human nature are articulated” (Lattas, 1992: 46). For example, in the mid-18th century French intellectuals used the discourse of ‘noble hunter-gatherers’ to critique the status quo and facilitate the French Revolution (Sackett, 1991: 240). This social Darwinian trope has pervasive usage in contemporary parlance. For example, the need to adopt low-consumption lifestyles is labeled “stone age” by opponents to environmental justice. “Primitive” is used to describe behaviour that is repetitive, ritualistic and unthinking and is synonymous with “backwardness” (Lattas, 1992: 47). Mass culture is criticised as having “regressed” to a “primordial instinctual past” due to a perceived departure from the “individuated and reflective subject” (ibid). Lattas (1992: 50) argues that public intellectuals “create and require a sense of spiritual crisis in order to create a need for personal and national redemption”. Paradoxically, ‘Aboriginal culture’ is then mined in order to fill a perceived spiritual vacuum through discovering the ‘Dreaming’ or the unique relationships Aboriginal peoples have with nature (McIntosh, 2002: 23; Rolls, 2000: 150). This sentiment has inspired novels such as Marlo Morgan’s Mutant Messages Down Under, to which Indigenous peoples, upon whom the book is ostensibly based, have protested (Povinelli, 1988b: 10). Further, the construction of Indigenous peoples as “original stewards” leads conservationists to assume Aboriginal people will respond in particular ways to ‘development’ projects. When they do not, (often because there is no alternative to ameliorating the exigencies of the colonial legacy of poverty) they are viewed as a “disappointment”, as occurred in the Kakadu uranium and Daintree road cases (Sackett, 1991: 242). Cowlishaw (1998: 156) illustrates the process by which white officials became ‘ventriloquists’ of Rembarrnga people’s “wishes” producing “communities” who conformed to white officials’ visions of progress. In seeking to counter anti-self-determination rhetoric, liberals muted their fears of failure should they be seen as “mistaken about Aborigines’ desires or abilities” (ibid). When Indigenous peoples fail to conform to such images they run the risk of dismissal or, as is common, being labeled “engineers” of their own “failure”. Imagined portrayals are used as a sounding board for settler identities, whether it is to affirm ones superiority or critique/ameliorate the crises of modernity.

Indigenous peoples responses are crucial to understanding subjectivities and how they form. Whilst settler discourses of the ‘Other’ may be internalised, Aboriginal peoples have also constructed politicised identities. However, non-Aboriginal people (myself included) seldom discern the subtleties of resistance and it is largely ignored by disciplines such as anthropology (Cowlishaw, 1988: 88). Moreton-Robinson (2003: 128) suggests,

“There is no single, fixed or monolithic form of Indigenous resistance: rather than simply being a matter of overtly defiant behaviour, resistance is…multifaceted, visible and invisible, conscious and unconscious, explicit and covert, intentional and unintentional”.

Nor is silence necessarily subservience, for example, Denise Groves (Palmer & Grovers, 2000: 36) describes Aboriginal women ‘domestics’ who subtly disrupted the ‘slave/Master’ relationship by only talking when granted permission. Paradoxically, “overcoming domination involves engaging with domination to struggle against it”, thus ‘choice’ is not the essence of resistance (Sider, 1987: 7). Indigenous writers, academics and artists are often pressured to compromise their work to satisfy publisher or audience preferences for stereotypic and non-threatening discourses (Perkins, 2003: 102). One may, for example, reject the (loaded) label ‘Aboriginal artist’ or one may work within colonial discourses in order to generate a ‘counter discourse’ (Ariss, 1988: 132). For example, Badtjala woman Fiona Foley engaged lawyers when her Witnessing to Silences, commissioned by Brisbane’s Magistrates Court, was threatened with censure (Foley, 2006: 23).

Furthermore, colonial discourses exhibit incompleteness, instability and ambivalence, reflected in the way stereotypes “must be anxiously repeated” (Bhaba, 1983: 18). These ‘cracks’ are cleverly exploited as sites of contestation and transformation (Palmer & Groves, 2000: 36). Songs, dramatisations and inversions comprise a rich tapestry of private or ‘hidden transcripts’ (Furniss, 2006: 183). I was humoured by a story of an Aboriginal woman in a rural township who removed her clothes in public then screamed as (white, male) police officers attempted to seize her, causing the police to hastily retreat (Cowlishaw, 1988b: 98). Denise Groves (Palmer & Groves, 2000: 34) describes an Aboriginal academic who ‘plays up’ to non-Aboriginal students’ expectations that “Indigenous people who live in urban settings have lost their culture and become modernists” and then disrupts this by beginning a lecture in Nyungar. ‘Non-violent’ Aboriginal resistance takes two distinct forms: demand for equal citizenship emphasising ‘similarities’ and demands for land rights, self-determination and sovereignty emphasising ‘difference’ (Stokes, 1997: 162). In short, Indigenous peoples are either treated as “equal” but also as identical (resulting in assimilation) or as different (but not according to their own terms or conceptual systems) (Patton, 1995: 87). Murphy (2000: 30) argues that Aboriginal peoples’ representations of Aboriginality through, for example, the Tent Embassy and Native Title, constitute “false radicalism” and “undermine the very status upon which we articulate our difference because we place ourselves within their paradigms of ‘object’ and ‘other’ ”. Similarly, Taiaiake Alfred (2009: 23) argues that ‘sovereignty’ is “an exclusively European discourse” which has “limited the ways in which we are able to think, suggesting always a conceptual and definitional problem centred on the accommodation of indigenous peoples within a “legitimate” framework of settler state governance” (ibid). Resistances are threatened by settlers’ desires for an identical (equal) vs. ‘pure’ (different) indigenous subject (Kowal, 2009: 236). However there are also numerous indigenous critiques of how ‘Aboriginality’ is expressed through resistance. But perhaps it is within these discursive ‘cracks’ that lie possibilities for insight and transformation.

In seeking to expose the imaginary of colonial discourses and recognise ‘Aboriginal people as Aboriginal people’ (Murphy, 2000: 35) there remains the risk of missing the point that Aboriginality is contested among Indigenous peoples. ‘Aboriginal-as-subject’ (Langton, 2009) is necessarily diverse because colonial discourses have not been uniform or fixed, nor have indigenous peoples’ responses. How do settlers and the settler-state engage with this multiplicity and complexity? Is it even possible for the latter to do so? The state, with its own ideological and philosophical foundations has associated itself with certain expressions of Indigeneity that do not challenge the hegemony of liberal democracy. Throughout this essay I have attempted to convey not only what (negative/positive) stereotypes colonial discourse produces but also “an understanding of the processes of subjectification made possible (and plausible) through stereotypic discourse” (Bhaba, 1983:18, original emphasis). If identities are entangled then won’t an ‘entangled dialogue’ be necessary in order to transform the ‘entanglement’? Who will be entitled to ‘speak for’ or re-present Aboriginalities and settler identities? Should only “self presentations” be possible? Is there a role for settlers in re-presenting Aboriginalities with or without Aboriginal peoples’ involvement? How can non-Indigenous people disrupt colonial discourses? Moreover, how do we become critically aware of the way in which settlers’ desires, interests and identities underpin the Aboriginalist discourse? When we are asked to describe what things make up our own culture and identity, do we go blank, puzzled, confused? Denise Groves (Palmer & Groves, 2000: 37) states,

“Being constructed as white you are both positioned as everything and nothing”.

Although I consider myself as ‘subaltern’ in some ways (and as ‘oppressor’ in others) I only recently came upon the idea that ‘whiteness’ is invisible to those upon whom it confers privilege. If we cannot see the entanglement of identities, then we cannot begin to transform Indigenous-settler relations. Further, how do we go about this when for the most part “Australians do not know and relate to Aboriginal people. They relate to stories told by former colonists” (Langton, 1993: 33) or the media or academia…? And when the potential for misunderstanding is so great as Cowlishaw illustrates in her analysis of “community” meetings between state officials and Rembarrnga. How can we overcome this solipsism? To what extent must settlers become other than what we are and other than how we know, in order to see Aboriginal peoples as “truly other, something capable of being not merely an imperfect state of oneself” (Todorov in Patton, 1985: 42)… or an idealised state? Kaplan (Langton, 1993: 25) suggests, “We can only enter from where we stand, unless we want simply to mimic those we aim to know about. Mimicry…is not knowledge”. In Singing the Land, Signing the Land Helen Watson (1989: 8) observes,

“the process of mediation between two ways of knowing inevitably involves transformation”.

And I wonder, what does this mediation look like, where does it take place, how does power operate, what does it lead to?

References

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[feministfocus]

GLI leaders and alum march in Women’s Marches around the country

Photo by Urooba Abid at Women’s March NYC

By Caeli Waldron & GLI Student Leaders

On Saturday, January 21st an estimated five million people marched worldwide to support girls’ rights and women’s rights in light of the regressive and dangerous language, planned policies, and proposed nominees for this new administration under Donald Trump. People from all walks of life, identities, and experiences attended with their action-provoking posters and pink “pussy hats” to stand up against the racism, bigotry, ableism, xenophobia, transphobia, and sexism perpetuated by Trump’s administration, including hundreds of Girls Learn International student leaders and alum from around the country.

Students protested in marches in many different towns around the country - like Traverse, MI, San Diego, CA, Rochester, NY, New Orleans, LA, Park City, UT - and marches in larger cities that saw attendance levels soar to 500,000-700,000 attendees - like Boston, Los Angeles, Chicago, and D.C. They were there to let the new administration know that this generation of youth activists will not allow leaders like Trump to diminish their rights and dictate how they think, as well as affirm that intersectional activism - as outlined in the official Women’s March on Washington organizers’ “Unity Principles” - must be at the forefront of our efforts as we move forward.

“We believe that Women’s Rights are Human Rights and Human Rights are Women’s Rights. We must create a society in which women - including Black women, Native women, poor women, immigrant women, disabled women, Muslim women, lesbian queer and trans women - are free and able to care for and nurture their families, however they are formed, in safe and healthy environments free from structural impediments.”

During several of the marches, GLI student leaders and staff, under the direction of our parent organization Feminist Majority Foundation, volunteered to sign attendees up to receive alerts from the Feminist Alert Network in order to continue the momentum after the marches were over. It’s important now more than ever to keep the movements going and to continue to take action for equality by encouraging people to join the Feminist Alert Network.

In their own words and images, GLI student leaders and alum talk about why they marched and what they envision for our inclusive movements for equality moving forward.

Photo by Miriam Ellis at NOLA Women’s March with Chapter members Genny Haylock, Lucy Currence, Marlee Jackson, and Margot Koch

“My friends and I are marching because we want to remind everyone that just watched the inauguration that our president encouraged and laughed about sexual assault. We don't want them to forget that he called Hillary Clinton a "nasty woman" and Alicia Machado "Miss Piggy." We want everyone to know that we will not be degraded, assaulted, or demeaned and we demand equality and respect as citizens of America.” -- Miriam Ellis, Louise S. McGehee High School (LA), NOLA Women’s March

Photo on the left by Miriam Ellis with Chapter members. Photo on right, of Chapter members Jordan and Paige Sentino who were asked to join the stage at the NOLA Women’s March, taken by The Times-Picayune.

Photo by GLI alum Lauren Rothschild at Women’s March Boston

“The women's march was an amazing event and definitely one of the best moments of my life as an activist. The show of support domestically and globally was truly outstanding. It made me extremely hopeful that people will continue to come out to support marginalized folks in the future and look more deeply into the value of intersectional activism.” -- Lauren Rothschild, Northeastern University, Women’s March Boston

“On Saturday I'll be marching in Boston, Mass with my parents and my sister (who is also in GLI). I think it's important for me to show up and for anyone at all to show up because numbers matter. If millions of people show up all around the country to say that they're not ok with their rights being infringed upon, then people will take heed. I hope it will be a wake up call to Trump and others who thought this would be easy.” -- Jane Thomas, Louise S. McGehee High School (LA), Women’s March Boston

Photo by Urooba Abid at the Women’s March NYC

“The NYC women's march was an experience I'll never forget. Seeing so many people act on their political and social convictions was unbelievably empowering. As a proud immigrant girl, I attended the march to show my support for equal rights for all people -- regardless of gender, race, sexual orientation, or religion. My only hope is that the march inspired fellow activists and citizens to join in the movement and speak out.” -- Urooba Abid, Farmingdale High School (NY), Women’s March NYC

Photos by Susan Lin of Kathy Zhuo (right) at the Women’s March San Diego

“We march to guarantee human rights for everyone, regardless of religion, sexuality, race, or gender. I hope that we all see the Women's March as a beacon of hope and a symbol of unity, and never stop fighting for what we believe in by being active in our communities.” -- Kathy Zhuo, Canyon Crest Academy (CA), Women’s March San Diego

Photos by GLI alum and Wellesley College student, Izzy Gelfand (left and far right), at the Women’s March NYC

“I hope that these marches can make some real change. Since politicians are seeing that people aren't going to take this, I hope that there can be some legislation, laws, etc. that can be put into effect.” -- Anisa Isaac, Appomattox Regional Governor’s School (NJ), Virtual Attendee

Photo by Emma Kautz (left) at the Women’s March on Washington

“I march because fighting for human rights is my passion and my purpose on this Earth. I will hold a sign, yell loudly, stride unapologetically alongside my mother, my friends that I have known since 1st grade, and thousands of other people that, like me, believe women are power. I march because women's health is vital to the health of a country, because my right to marry a woman I love should never be questioned, because women's rights are human rights, and because my silence will not protect me.” -- Emma Kautz, Liberty High School (PA), Women’s March DC

Photo by Marisa Umeh-Burchell at the Women’s March on Washington.

“Looking at history books, it's easy to feel as if mass protesting for human rights is a thing of the past. However, as history repeated itself, every woman at the March on Washington realized they too would have to make a decision of what side of history they were going to be on. Learning about the civil rights protests in elementary, I always wondered if I would be a part of the crowd or watch from a distance. It was a pleasure to document and be apart of living history.“ -- Marisa Umeh-Burchell, Diamond Bar High School (CA), Women’s March on Washington

Photo by Soemi Photavath at Women’s March on Washington

“I'm marching because I believe in uncovering prejudices. When we choose to embrace and learn from people of all walks of life, we find ourselves becoming worldly, decent people. An inclusive society is a loving society!” -- Soemi Photavath, South Lakes High School (VA), Women’s March on Washington

Photo by Jenna Zucker (far right) at Traverse City Women’s March in Michigan

“Why I march -- I march because of the women and girls who have marched before me and have brought us so far in history. I march for the girls whose voices are silenced. I march for the girls who do not have the ability to march.  I march for my grandmother. I think about how my grandmother was forced to march to the factory in the concentration camps each day. I march for the thousands of girls who cannot march and cannot walk to school each day. I march for girls' voices during a Trump presidency; for the girls who cannot vote but who must be heard.” -- Jenna Zucker, Interlochen Arts Academy (MI), Traverse City Women’s March in Michigan

Photo by Caeli Waldron of students (left to right) Phoebe Kong, Brielle Underwood, and Alexa Bates from Marlborough High School at Women’s March Los Angeles

"I marched for the right of every individual to his/her/their own body." -- Phoebe Kong, Marlborough School (CA), Women’s March Los Angeles

"Although the march wasn't specifically directed at Donald Trump, because it was the day after the inauguration, I, like many others, directed a lot of my feelings towards him. So I marched for the women that Trump offended during his candidacy, the black and Latinos he put down, the LGBTQ people that he and Pence made feel unsafe, and the disabled people that felt offended by his comments. These things among many others were reasons why I marched. I think that although this was a fight for women's rights, it was so much more than that. It was a chance for all of the people in Los Angeles to stand in solidarity for our rights and the rights of others." -- Alexa Bates, Marlborough School (CA), Women’s March Los Angeles

Photo by Isha Kenkare (right) at the People’s Solidarity Rally in Rochester, NY

“Regardless of differences in race, religion, sexuality, and gender, thousands came to the rally in Rochester to support the fundamental rights for women and minorities, something that was amazing and inspiring to see. I hope that such experiences continue to occur in the future and also continue to remind lawmakers and politicians that our human rights cannot and should not be taken away.” -- Isha Kenkare, Pittsford Sutherland High School (NJ), People’s Solidarity Rally in Rochester, NY

Photos by Cyan Jackson at the Sundance Women’s March in Park City, Utah. On the left, Cyan takes the oath to “to preserve and defend the Constitution” led by Aisha Tyler and Connie Britton.

“I marched for and as part of my generation, with hope for the future. I marched as part of this community walking beside me, with the peace of mind that all there believe that women and men are equal and both should be treated with equal respect. That's why we marched through the snow, freezing and shivering. That motivation that pushed i and others forward was positive; i want to see these ideas we marched for become reality in the future. Hopefully sooner than later.” -- Cyan Jackson, Pilgrim School (CA), Sundance Women’s March in Park City, UT

Photos by Larissa Lim at the Women’s March Los Angeles

“I marched because I don't want the current political behavior we are experiencing from the new administration to become normalized. We know now that more than 3 million Americans (and many other around the globe) marched in solidarity and violence-free defiance. It was an incredible feeling to march alongside strangers who felt like friends -- We need to continue to persevere and protect our human rights.“ -- Larrisa Lim, Santa Monica High School (CA), Women’s March Los Angeles

Photo by Gabrielle Gorman of alum and Harvard student, Amanda Gorman, at Women’s March Los Angeles

“We fought a hell of a battle but the war isn't over. Trump intends to continue development of the DAPL despite the efforts of Standing Rock Sioux. Surrounded by men, he just signed an Executive Order to defund International Planned Parenthood. Let's keep fighting, because the March of social justice warriors never stops.“ -- Amanda Gorman, Harvard, Women’s March Los Angeles

Photo by Caeli Waldron of girl protestor “Niko” at Women’s March Los Angeles

Photo by Urooba Abid at Women’s March NYC of posters left at one of Trump’s buildings

Caeli Waldron is the Associate Director of Chapter Development at Girls Learn International, a program of the Feminist Majority Foundation.

[khalilhumam]

Wikipedia project boosts Taiwan's hundreds-strong Sakizaya-speaking community

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New Post has been published on http://khalilhumam.com/wikipedia-project-boosts-taiwans-hundreds-strong-sakizaya-speaking-community/

Wikipedia project boosts Taiwan's hundreds-strong Sakizaya-speaking community

For some older speakers, using technology is challenging. For those less fluent, grammar is the headache.

The Sakizaya people. Screen capture from Youtube.

In November 2019, Wikipedia editors who are native speakers of the Sakizaya language of Taiwan got the perfect gift — a Wikipedia for their own language. There are 299 active Wikipedias in 299 different languages. The Sakizaya Wikipitiya, as it is called in Sakizaya language, currently has 1,759 articles written by around 40 active volunteer editors. Like all Wikipedias, it is open to all for reading and contributions. Wikipedia editing largely involves creating new encyclopedic content, editing existing articles, and translating existing content from other languages on Wikipedia. The Taiwan government only recognized Sakizaya people as a distinct ethnic group from 2007. For 129 years prior to that, the group had been classified as Amis in ethnic classifications. This was because people belonging to the Sakizaya group began to intentionally hide their ethnic identity after a devastating battle with Qing invaders in the late 19th Century which is referred to by the Sakizaya as the “Takubuwan Battle”. Currently the indigenous community is based mostly in the cities of Keelung, Taoyuan City, New Taipei, and Hualien County. The official population of the community was 985 as of January 2020. Below is a short video on the history of Sakizaya people produced by The Council of Indigenous Peoples: [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w92j53fL7aA?feature=oembed&w=650&h=366] To learn more about the development of Sakizaya Wikipedia and the digital activism efforts behind it, Rising Voices reached out to Lami Tsai-Wei Hung, one of the active editors of the Wikipedia and a PhD scholar in the Department of Ethnic Relations and Cultures at the National Dong Hwa University in Taiwan. Lami has also helped to run the Sakizaya mentor-apprentice program funded by Taiwan government. Rising Voices (RV): What is the current state of the Sakizaya language and how is it used in everyday life, education and media?

Lami Tsai-Wei Hung (LH): Along with six other indigenous languages in Taiwan, Sakizaya is classified as “critically endangered” by UNESCO. For its vitality, Ethnologue, a guide on living languages of the world, classifies the language as “institutional,” meaning the language has been developed to the point that it is used and sustained by institutions beyond home and community settings. However, Ethnologue’s assessment may not reflect actual status. Though the 2020 statistics suggests that there are about 985 registered members of Sakizaya, the number of actual speakers could be as low as 590 as it hasn’t been fully passed down to the younger generation. Many Sakizaya elders above 55 might be fluent, yet urban dwellers and youths might not be. While there’s no designated TV channel or radio station in Sakizaya, the Taiwan Indigenous TV (TITV) and the FM96.3 Alian Radio broadcast in local indigenous languages including Sakizaya. However, the lead anchors are in their sixties and therefore [lack] young audiences. The government has become more aware of the [need to use] indigenous languages along with Mandarin for public announcements. While it has made policies more indigenous-friendly and brought more subsidies to language revitalization programs, this has not helped much in raising public interest.

RV: Can you elaborate more about the use of Sakizaya in education?

LH: So we have this mandatory “native language curriculum” for everyone till 9th grade, which takes place one hour per week. Students can enroll in any preferred language as long as the school has a teacher for it. And if a student intends to learn Sakizaya, the school is obliged to find them a teacher for the language. At the moment, there are about 15 teachers and 60 students for Sakizaya in elementary schools and junior high schools across the country.

RV: Wikipedia in a new language is always a huge challenge for the community as there is a need for published resources like noted newspapers, journals, books, etc. What resources have you provided to bring Sakizaya Wikipedia live?

LH: Some contributors built on existing entries in (traditional) Chinese and English Wikipedia by translating them into Sakizaya. This makes the job easier because they can use the references already cited in the related entries. Meanwhile, some referred encyclopedias when making entries on indigenous herbs. These are two practices that we recommended to our community as they save time. Some went further and did additional research on Google, YouTube, newspapers and academic publications for entries that weren’t covered yet in Wikipedia. Some even wrote about basketball players, comics books, American TV series and anything that interests them. Of course, elders with in-depth knowledge concerning the Sakizaya people, their history and their places of heritage usually work on [articles] on their own, with maybe some technical assistance from young people.

RV: How large and active is the editor community at the moment? Do you have a specific focus area as a community?

LH: We have about 30 active editors right now. -Ten of them are from the Mentor-Apprentice Program funded by the government. Tuku and I designed the Sakizaya program under this framework. It has been running for two years now and will conclude its first term by the end of 2020. To foster commitment, participants in the program are provided with long-term subsidies as they cultivate their language skills. And this program requires that they contribute to the Wikipedia project on a monthly basis — with entries or maintenance work. The remaining editors are those who have been contributing since the inception of Sakizaya Wikipedia on Wikimedia Incubator.

RV: Are there any ongoing initiatives to raise awareness of COVID-19 (coronavirus) on Sakizaya Wikipedia?

LH: COVID-19 is too enormous to be ignored. Because one of the Mentor-Apprentice program’s goals is to make Sakizaya part of our modern life, we designated a whole session of our class to it. So far, we have published two COVID-19 entries—  COVID-19 and “satebuc nu kitakit” (catastrophes worldwide).

RV: Tell us more about your future plans as a community.

LH: We definitely need to expand our editing community much more and encourage them to write on a regular basis. However, not all native speakers are familiar with Sakizaya grammar, use of computers and Wikipedia editing. In contrast, those who are privileged with computer access and capable of editing are most likely not very fluent in the language. Many have difficulty incorporating Wikipedia editing into their daily routine. So I proposed a plan for training workshops and editing competitions and hopefully both will be rolled out soon. We will make circuits of workshops among seven of our tribes so that elders and youths can be paired up for editing. Young people can make drafts in Chinese and then ask the elders to rephrase or translate the content into Sakizaya, or the elders can orally narrate for the youth to type up. Still, we hope young people will be able to do it all by themselves some day. We are planning to take advantage of social media in growing the community. For example, we will announce a topic every month on Facebook and invite followers who are native speakers and/or active learners to join us in strengthening Sakizaya Wikipedia. We hope this will help them stay engaged, while helping us locate potential candidates for further mentoring.

RV: How do you plan to collaborate with like-minded organizations and Wikipedia editors from Taiwan and other countries?

LH: While Sakizaya Wikipedia was being developed in the Incubator, we worked very closely with the Center for Aboriginal Studies at the National Chengchi University, which encouraged every indigenous language student to start a Wikipedia project in their own language on Wikimedia Incubator. We have also been in touch with Wikimedia Taiwan, an affiliated local Wikimedia Chapter. The Center along with Wikimedia Taiwan has provided our Wikipedia community with technical and consultative assistance. Both organizations have continued to support us to this day.

***** Nuwatan o Kumud, a Sakizaya elder, told of his struggle to learn how to edit Wikipedia and encouraged young Sakizaya speakers to join the community in an audio message. Below is an excerpt of the message transcribed and translated by Buting Nukay and Miku Kumud:

Step by step, I gradually learned to write and edit Wikipedia [entries]. What I have written down is everything I think needed to be documented. These are the footsteps and tribal affairs of our people. I want to put them all onto Wikipedia…I think you can do it — learning to edit Wikipedia [entries] while working with a mouse in front of the computer. If even I can learn to do so, youngsters like you with a flexible mind should have no problem at all.

< p class='gv-rss-footer'>Written by Subhashish Panigrahi, Yanne C. · comments (0) Donate · Share this: twitter facebook reddit

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japanese girls

Japanese Mail Order Brides

If you are trying to find long-lasting relationships, of course, you are aware of Eastern girls. Their far eastern wonderful appeal as well as submissiveness, quietness and hubby’ s recognizing can easily certainly not leave behind detached also the strictest guy. Along withthe unusual appeal and also exterior delicacy, these girls are actually distinguished by their meticulous childhood, reverence for household and God.

The most popular one of all Eastern brides are japanese girls https://onlinemillionairedatingsites.com/japanese-brides/ There are actually a lot of instances in the practice of Oriental dating websites about happy and also long relationships along withsuchgirls. Many men agree to devote months seeking a far eastern bride-to-be since they are actually substantially various coming from their normal Western women in a lot of means.

Many feel that Japanese women are actually the best other halves worldwide. Is it thus? Let’ s take care of this short article. If you want to know exactly how to comply withJapanese ladies online, it will certainly additionally be useful for you to examine our component.

Find Japanese Better Half Along WithModern Technology

Japanese mail order bride-to-bes can be effortlessly located on focused dating sites. On the web, there is a massive lot of them. Our experts have actually picked up the leading 8 greatest as well as established services:

Wishdates. com

Ukrainiancharm. com

Bravodate. com

Asianfeels. com

Matchtruly. com

Latinfeels. com

Datingbloom. com

Lovingfeel. com

All you need to find one of the most stunning girl on your own is actually merely to enroll in a few measures, fill in the required forms for a hunt robot and acquire some debts for never-ending interaction withthe girls on the site. Every thing else is presently figured for you –- the very best girls in the world, checked out profile pages as well as people who produce all of them, protection and personal privacy of utilization the information, constantly improving participation, straightforward and convenient user interface, as well as very competitive prices.

If you have any type of device, it’ s effortless to discover a lifestyle partner. You are going to clearly see a huge demand for japanese girls on these information, and also it is actually fairly logical.

Why Japanese Women?

Magical Unique Appeal

It is challenging to describe in a few words just how beautiful they are actually. Yes, they have the same uncommon eyes as various other Asians. They additionally possess darker dense hair, neatly prepared or even grouped. They are the managers of elegant and also slender amounts that make all of them completely different from grown-up girls. But it is actually the Japanese that have one thing in their appearance that makes all of them appreciate them for hrs on end. They are actually not simply pretty, they are actually cute and there are not one other like them in the world. Probably, you are going to long pick between the many questionnaires considering that it is actually difficult to create an unquestionable selection –- they are so great.

Japanese Other Halves Are Actually the Providers of Perfect Good Manners

Most of their family members are conventional. Primarily, these girls are quiet and humble, they perform not generate concerns on their own and also others, as well as it will certainly be challenging to discover them in loud business. If one thing occurs, any kind of concern is going to be resolved quickly and also without drawing in any sort of focus. The partner, being polite as well as smart along withothers, will create the most effective impression on the settings. Girls are actually thought about what others think of their boys, therefore whatever will certainly be performed to create this viewpoint the greatest.

They Appreciation Your Individual Area

By quality of their instruction as well as customs, the Japanese regard the demand for being alone, as well as will certainly not hurry right into creating any type of choices. If the hubby needs to have to rest from everyone, she will definitely withdraw withunderstanding and also will definitely not interfere along withthought and feelings.

They Value Family Members

At any sort of age, Japanese mail-order new bride is actually oriented on developing a family. Consequently, any existing or even beginning partnership she will definitely certify as an action in the direction of making a family members. The option of a life companion need to be properly thought out as well as can easily not be actually very soon. It is actually far better to be truthful as well as nice along withthem, right away pinpointing the stable of your interests on a dating web site. And also if the relationship is actually not yet in your programs, quickly tell about it.

Career is actually certainly not the Target of Her Everyday Life

It seems odd to Western side women, but a Japanese female will certainly lose hope any kind of team up withcertainly if her household requirements. This is actually certainly not to mention that they do certainly not suchas or carry out certainly not would like to operate. The important things is that the very first concern for any Japanese lady is actually household. Consequently, they are servicing enjoyable ventures for themselves, certainly not making an effort to go up given that they know that they will definitely have to quit all this eachtime when the household needs additional of their energy and time.

Education is actually Essential for Japanese Ladies

The reality is that even withthe wild wishto start a household, girls still depend merely on themselves in regards to product support. They appreciate studying for several years, choosing all brand new areas of understanding. You will never ever be actually worn out withall of them in interaction. Educated and intelligent Japanese bride-to-bes will definitely manage to support any type of subject matter in the discussion and even participate in a little discussion.

They Passion Foreigners

Among some others things, it is the Japanese that enjoy foreigners, given that they will know muchmore new details along withthem. It is believed that nearby males devote little time withtheir women and carry out not interact along withthem in any way. That is actually why dating online withimmigrants as well as inter-ethnic marriages are something that is actually acquiring appeal amongst women of any age.

How to Entice japanese girls Over 40 or Younger Ladies

After reading throughthe above truths, you definitely wishto marry sucha fantastic girl. Additionally, it does not matter how outdated she is actually. Right here are some pointers for mesmerizing a Japanese female of any grow older:

Show Her Regard and also Focus

A great relationship is actually the crucial to the productive progression of relations along withany woman, and muchmore so witha Japanese girl. Welcome her to a really good dining establishment, give a little gift or even an arrangement of florals, as well as speak withher regarding something pleasing.

Learn a Few Terms in Japanese

In basic, the foreign language is worthperforming, given that couple of natives are well-versed in English. The female is going to be actually pleased withyour need to talk withher.

Show the Passion in Asian Culture

She, as a patriot of the country, will definitely be pleased. Talk to a lot of inquiries, Asia female for marital relationship is actually quite educated about nationwide custom-mades. Inquire her to provide you a brief journey around the hometown and to tell about the loved ones. If it is appropriate, request for a visit to figure out just how their life is organized. This is actually extremely fascinating, either for educational purposes or in building connections along withthe lady.

Respect Her Family

All future withthis woman depends on moms and dads’ ‘ viewpoint, so you ought to make an effort to leave behind a good opinion about your own self. It may not be actually achievable for the first time, however carry out certainly not cease making an effort

Be Sincere

Beautiful Japanese is quite truthful along withothers and they expect the same from all of them. Carry out not hesitate to show an individual standpoint on any sort of issue, present the girl simply an honest mindset towards her.

Be an Active Person

Show excitement in everywhere you can –- in learning, strolling, standard life. Series additionally assurance in on your own and also your activities. It additionally entices ladies.

Don’ t Consume Way too much

Since the Japanese are a sufficiently drinking country, especially men, girls are actually searching for a fella who will consume muchless. Excite her. Regardless, sucha lady is actually mainly interested in locating a foreign husband at the very least as a result of the seek new perceptions and also emotional states.

They are actually Fantastic Wives

As currently pointed out, a severe focus on the loved ones and also whatever associated withit produces the Japanese girls one of the most beneficial other halves. Specifically for males who are advocates of the conservative ideal of creating a family, where he is the head, and also she is actually the spirit. Suchgirls are going to be actually honoring their spouse all their lifestyles, looking after him, assisting him withrecommendations as well as an organized life to achieve goals as well as go up the occupation ladder. These girls are actually wonderful prepares. It carries out certainly not matter whether you like Eastern dishes or not, girls can easily find out just how to prepare whatever you as if.

japanese girls are stringent as well as caring moms. Their kids are actually regularly neighbored by treatment, interest, and affection. They are participated in the advancement as well as training of children, help them to obtain their objectives, cultivate regard for household as well as country.

Conclusion

Finding a lifestyle companion without exclusive skills and encounter could be carried out in merely a few months or even times. Only rely on brand new technologies, as well as they carry out everything at the highest level. All that is demanded for this is actually a gadget, a little bit of time and a handful of hundred dollars.

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